In my own experience, I always had problems with Jim's dialect, too (as well
as that of the characters in Joel Chandler Harris's stories).  This is where
I realized that I had learned English by the "look-say" method.  :-)  (I
remember even skipping over Jim's dialogue when I first read HF.)

One day, I happened to try some of the exercises in one of R. Flesch's
pro-phonics books that help one learn to read phonetically.  After that, I
returned to Jim, and found it much easier to read his dialect.  (An object
lesson on the absurd methods of teaching English in our country!)

On the other hand, hearing someone speak dialect is much more entertaining
-- I think -- than reading it.  When I was a kid, I enjoyed hearing my Mom
reading Joel Chandler Harris out loud, but couldn't make any sense of it
when I tried to read it for myself.

Then again, you could be an outstanding public speaker, and maybe that's why
your students want to hear stuff out loud!

>Our previous principal had a real problem with this practice.  He said
>he had been put to sleep by teachers reading aloud to him.  I have
>found, though, that he must be in the minority.  The consensus in our
>English department is that we procure the majority of our students' rapt
>attention when we read aloud to them.

LOL!  I remember that happening when listening to a book, but more often
when the book was about algebra.

>Reading aloud doesn't sustain a program, of course.  While students must
>read aloud themselves and practice silent reading, the most interested
>reactions I receive come from the times when I read to them.
>
>My theory is that family life today is either too rushed or non-existent
>for my students.  Some of my fondest childhood memories are of my dad
>reading _The Chronicles of Narnia_ to me.  It met a vital need for
>sharing and communicating and attention.  Perhaps my students get a
>little of that when I read to them.  These are important processess no
>matter how old you are.

Can't go wrong with Chronicles of Narnia.  (I wonder if anyone has read
aloud the Hobbit or Lord of the Rings, and has gotten a good reaction from
it.)

It was John Bird -- I think -- who said that younger folk don't really get
the humor of HF (and I would add, even of that masterpiece, Tom Sawyer).  I
don't ever remember finding Twain funny when I was in High School but only
when I was in college.  I happened to be visiting my Mom for Christmas and
found *Roughing It* on her shelf; started reading it; found myself laughing,
and wondering if this guy Twain could keep it up through the rest of the
book.  I kept reading, kept laughing, and continued to read anything of
Twain's I could get my hands on, as faithfully and as fanatically as I had
done when collecting and reading comic books a few years earlier.

So why doesn't anyone ever read *Roughing It* out loud?

Cordially,

Vern