Does Dr. Seuss Belong in Today's Kindergarten?

Does Dr. Seuss belong in kindergarten?  What am I asking?  My readers must think I'm like the Grinch who stole Christmas.  How dare I even ask the question?!

This past week, our entire school (kindergarten through second grade) listened to a different Dr. Seuss book each day.  A team of teachers selected the books, located the best read-aloud versions on the internet, and asked us all to share these books via our interactive whiteboards. 

These are the books our entire school read this week.

We listened to/viewed Fox in Socks first.  Within five minutes, one child piped up, "This is so lo--ong!"  A moment or two later, another child wondered aloud, "How many more pages!?" When we finished the book, I asked the children to rate it with one, two or three finger '"stars."  There were a variety of responses.  I called on one child who had rated the book with three stars. He said, "It was weird and I like weird stuff!"  Then I called on a child who rated it only one star.  He said, "It was weird and I DON"T like weird stuff!"

We don't actually stick stars on our fingers but kindergarteners love to rate everything!

I could totally relate to both of these boys' opinions. As a child, my younger brother loved listening to Dr. Seuss.  I couldn't believe it when he actually let me have his beloved copy of If I Ran the Circus when I first started teaching in 1977.  Conversely, as a child, I didn't like Dr. Seuss read-alouds too much.  I was much happier listening to my parents and teachers read The Story About Ping and Make Way for Ducklings.   

Which did you prefer as a child?

Although I wasn't crazy about Dr. Seuss books when they were read to me, I clearly remember my pride in being able to read One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish.  And I never missed the annual holiday TV showing of How The Grinch Stole Christmas!

Maybe it is just a matter of personal preference.  After all, Dr. Seuss, aka Theodor Geisel, was a prolific writer who wrote 45 children's books.  After that first day of our Seuss week, I thought I'd withhold judgment: maybe my kindergarteners would find a book that they liked!

Surely, one or two of these books would be a "hit" in kindergarten?!

I read them The Cat in the Hat, if only to clarify for them that a CAT was not the author of this book and the others we were going to read.  If you teach kindergarten, you know that many children confuse Dr. Seuss with The Cat.  Mission accomplished, I then asked the children what they liked or didn't like about this book.  Right away, a child said, "I didn't like that the mom left the kids alone in the house!"  And another child said, "I didn't like that the kids let The Cat in the house. He was a bad stranger!" 

Abandoned childen?  An intruder in the house?

It was this classroom discussion that raised the question in my mind, "Is Dr. Seuss outdated?"  A colleague of mine (also a blogger) had shared the opinion of some educators who are concerned about the racial and ethnic stereotypes and caricatures in the Seuss books.  An article in the School Library Journal this past September 12, 2017, was entitled "Is the Cat in the Hat Racist: Read Across America Shifts Away from Dr. Seuss and Toward Diverse Books."  Here is the link, if you are interested.

In defense of Theodor Geisel (aka Dr. Seuss), he was actually a very thoughtful, compassionate, anti-war person (think of The Butter Battle and Yertle the Turtle.)  I read a terrific (if a bit lengthy) article in an archived 1960 article in the New Yorker magazine.  It tells the story of how Geisel and his wife produced a film, "Design for Death," which won an Oscar in 1947. The message of the film was that the Japanese were a tranquil people who had been overrun by ruthless leaders.  The producer tried to liven up the film by inserting a frightening scene where an American tank barrelled through a crowd of Japanese.  The Geisels sneaked into the studio after hours and clipped and discarded that footage.  Nonetheless, Hollywood prevailed, and the posters advertising this film were horrific.  Here is the link.

We persevered through Dr. Seuss week in kindergarten!  Both If I Ran the Zoo and The Sleep Book .... put the children to sleep.  Literally.  

Wacky Wednesday was more appealing. The kids enjoyed looking for the "wacky" things in the illustrations.  They also enjoyed modeling their "wacky" hairstyles.

Green Eggs and Ham  was a familiar read for many of my students this year.  Many enjoyed it as a shared reading.  We had a good discussion about the value of trying new foods and other new experiences in life.

During the week, several children brought in Dr. Seuss books from home.  Of course, I loved that they made the connection and cared enough to bring in the books to share with us.  I also appreciated the opportunity to share the difference between a book by Dr. Seuss and a book in The Cat in the Hat's Learning Library and Beginner Books.  Books in these popular collections were written by other authors. Interestingly, I learned through my research that Geisel began these ventures to support other authors who had been inspired by his style of writing.  I think I was able to explain this to the kindergarteners in a way that some really appreciated Geisel's kindness.

And, of course, we did projects related to each book.  This year, I only selected projects that reinforced the "word play" or phonemic awareness aspect of Dr. Seuss books.  Here are pictures of the projects we did.  None of them are entirely original but all were effective tie-ins with Dr. Seuss books.

The students wrote words that rhymed with "hat" in boxes in every stripe of their hats.
They colored the stripes, cut out the hats, and glued them to blue paper.

The class had fun cutting out and gluing together heads and bodies of different animals.
They wrote the first syllable in each animals name to come up with new creations!

Everyone did their best to write upper case and lower case Ww's where they belonged and then they drew themselves and their wacky hair.

Of course, after we read The Sleep Book, we had to draw ourselves wearing the pajamas we wore to school that day.

So, upon reflection, what have I decided about the relevance of Dr. Seuss in today's kindergarten?  In my opinion, certain books are more appropriate than others for this age.  I like that some of the books lend themselves to important discussions about making good choices in life.  I think Seuss books are useful as mentor texts for experimenting with word play or phonemic awareness.  

What do YOU think about Dr. Seuss books in kindergarten?