What did you think of the book?

When I first started virtual teaching of learners who use AAC (most of whom also have neurodevelopment disabilities) lots of parents (and students) were surprised when I asked, “what did you think of the book?” after every book we read.
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For speaking folks it is usually the first question we ask when talking about a book, “oh I just read The Women by Kristen Hannah.”

“Really? How was it?”would be a usual book readers conversation starter.

However, for most alternative communicators that isn’t a question they hear. They are read to or read books themselves and are asked comprehension questions about books, but no one ever asks what they thought. Many parents were shocked to realize they don’t ask their AAC using kid if they liked a book and why.
Most of my students have been with me long enough now that they answer, “what did you think of the book” before I ask it. Often times it is mostly, “like” or “I like it” as a response. Some kids I push a little further and ask them why and others often give apt reasons. We just wrapped up learning about World War Two and many books were tremendously sad or brave or unfair. Many of my students noted these things.

To anyone who doesn’t work with or know a child who uses a speech device this might not seem like a big deal but, trust me, it is. People underestimate my students; they infantalize my students; they commit ongoing educational neglect against my students. No one expects them to comment on the bravery of Anne Frank or the sadness of a child exposed to the Hiroshima bomb dying after making 1000 paper cranes or to comment that it isn’t fair how Jackie Robinson was treated.

They definitely don’t expect my students to further comment something along the lines of, “makes me think, my old school, seclusion, segregation, not fair”. So it is important for the world to know that my students DO comment on books and make deep and important connections with them - even books that are considered to be “beyond” them. I’m not saying every child makes every inference and deeply connects with every book - but typical kids don’t do that either.

I am saying that my students deserve to learn about Anne Frank and the holocaust, and Pearl Harbor and Hiroshima, and Jackie Robinson and Josephine Baker because all of these topics are things we expect everyone to know about. They do not deserve a (whole freaking) lifetime of Brown Bear, Brown Bear and The Very Hungry Caterpillar (you would not believe how common this is - preschool books their whole lives). They deserve to be asked their opinions and to be taught how to share their opinions. They deserve teachers who want to hear their opinions.