In The Times the other day there was a story about an author whose sales had surpassed Dan Brown’s, the author of “The Da Vinci Code.”
The other author has not gained the fame and fortune of Brown but her books have sold more than his. Naomi Simmons, a young English woman, wrote a series of textbooks entitled “New Standard English.”
The books are aimed at primary schoolchildren and 106 million copies have been sold. Why, we may well wonder, have the books been so successful?
According to the newspaper, the books were written for Chinese schoolchildren and have become a great hit. Get this straight: A school book has become a favorite of millions of children! Evidently the children do indeed adore it since they have made up songs and invented games inspired by the books.
Ms. Simmons told the Times that the success was due to the radical nature of her books which were intended to make students “laugh.”
The idea behind them is to introduce English language and culture to Chinese children; some of them have been turned into cartoons and broadcast on Chinese TV.
The author says that Chinese children are very surprised that English people use a fork and knife for eating or that they put milk in their tea and that through the books, the children have learned about another culture and enjoyed learning about it.
This is a wonderful story which says many things about how much fun and pleasure the act of learning should be for children. It also makes clear that those who write school books are not only creative but are also financially rewarded.
Ms. Simmons was only paid 160,000 pounds but the Times suggested she should get some royalties from the sale of the books as well.
If we think at all seriously about this, we might pinpoint a few of the problems that we have in our schools in Saudi Arabia. First of all, the text books in our schools bore the students.
Before anyone disagrees, I suggest they ask the students if they would like to see their books turned into cartoons. The second thing is that the people who wrote the books which have been such a success in China were committed, creative and well-paid. Here, our writers may be committed but they are certainly not creative — just look at the books — and equally certainly not well-paid.
So here we are stuck with boring books, often with outdated information that students memorize without any understanding. There is no joy in learning here; it is something that is forced on children and it is dry, lifeless and the least entertaining thing you could imagine.
Surely there are better ways of talking to children and getting them interested in education! What about a child’s mind and his or her creativity? We almost never take children seriously and they know that and realize that they are being condescended to. I was struck by this when I saw a huge poster in a London Underground station. It was done by a student and carried a caption: “This work was done by a student of such-and-such a school.”
The idea was that the quality of education and attainment at the school would impress the public but it also promoted the work of a student in a most satisfying way. I wonder how long it will be until we see the work of one of our students hung on our streets for all to see and admire.
