So let me understand. Sasha had a paragraph about Daniel Boone that did not offer an opinion or judgment (or, for that matter, an author)? And then he used the information in it to create an opinion of his own? Here's MY question: would he have done this if the paragraph had been strongly opinionated about something (say about Boone and Native Americans), a judgment? Would he still have independently done the same thing?

Yes, the para was bland and he then asked a question of his own. You ask a good question. I suspect that a para that modeled asking questions or venturing views might encourage him to do the same. Could it intimidate him into silence? Perhaps, though I don't see why it should.

Monica: to kick the question back to you, why would you assume that an author modeling the act of venturing an interpretation would work differently from an author modeling anything else -- writing well, doing good research, employing telling details? Why in this one case would the model have the reverse effect? And I have a good counter example -- for hundreds of years in Yeshivas boys have read interpretations -- which has encouraged them to interpret texts, it has not silenced them.

I have no idea how the boys in Yeshivas are taught, but I do a lot of work on learning to read. There are different reasons for reading --- sometimes we just want information in which case something bland like the Daniel Boone piece might be appropriate. Other times we want to read an opinion. I used to use the Times in my teaching. We considered very differently articles in the first section from editorials and op-ed pieces. Some people may prefer their news without opinion and some may prefer the opinion. And in the classroom, it is always the teacher not the writer who knows her students and what they need to best understand. And what they need to understand could be Daniel Boone or an opinion about Daniel Boone --- two very different things.

But I think it's always the reader who approaches any work with his/her own reasons for reading -- just to get the facts or perhaps just for passing the time or perhaps just for reading an opinion -- and we'll find that purpose ourselves no matter what the text. So, it seems to me that rather than try to select texts that to us represent different kinds of reading, that having youngsters read the same pieces of text -- from Internet info on Daniel Boone to a nuanced biography -- and ask themselves how they read it would be an instructive approach. What cues can they use to figure out their stance? And, no matter what their purpose, shouldn't they have some measure of questioning going on? I read People Magazine like an addict on Fridays; this is diversion (despite what some of my friends may think), but it's always read with the same amount of skepticism as I look at the editorial page. And with the same kind of questioning although the questions may be more vapid coming from People than from OpEd pieces.

Monica: you know students, but it seems to me you are in a logical trap. Last week you and Betsy said all NF was biased -- that every piece of NF reflected a set of judgmments on the part of the author. If that is so, a bland piece that hides its POV is no less judgmental than a piece that makes a case. A dictionary has a POV (which words are in, which out, which favored), as do voiceless texts. For example, I think you would find a bland paragraph about the deaths of Native Americans to be biased, because it had no moral power. You would find the blandness a form of avoidance, or callousness. If that is so, then you are demanding a voice -- to be objective. But then you have to allow for other voices.

What I do as a teacher is model for students and guide them in particular methods of reading for historical reasons to give them tools with which to do that. Of course there are many other reasons to read and that may and does happen all the time. My job as a teacher is to give them tools for particular ways. As for bias, I don't see the problem, Marc. It has to do with what I do as a teacher. If I'm focusing on a given day on opinion that is what I'll focus my students' attention (while pointing out the information therein). If it is information, then that is what I'll focus on. These are kids just beginning to go beyond the basics of reading as you may recall. And much of what I'm doing is teaching kids to read, in a variety of ways, highlighting and featuring certain ones on any given day. I'm teaching reading to newly independent readers and make decisions based on my expertise in that area along with caring about much else. I don't see that emphasizing one over the other is a logic problem.

Monica: Your concern is teaching, mine is writing. I am saying that, since any tone in a book, from bland dictionary to empassioned plea, represents a judgment on the part of the author, why not encourage authors to be more open about their judgments? How you as a teacher use texts that are more, or less, explicit about their POVs is up to you. As an author, I believe an explicit, considered judgment is both more honest than a studied blandness, and provides a model for how a student can frame his or her own arguments.