Wednesday is the 65th birthday of cartoonist Jim Davis, the creator of the Garfield comic strip.
Garfield is my favorite comic and I still read it in the paper everyday. In fact, it was my love of Garfield as a kid, which helped me learn how to read.
I found it interesting that a study by the Canadian Council on Learning (CCL) has found comic books help develop a child’s ability to follow a sequence of events, interpret symbols and predict what will happen next.
The study found that comics especially help boys catch up to girls in reading achievement. The CCL suggests comic books could hold the key to promoting literacy in boys.
So the question is, should comic books be used in schools to help children learn to read? Jim Smalley will talk about this on Thursday’s edition of Newsline at Noon on 620 CKRM.
