Mitali's Fire Escape asks, "Is a Sixth Grader a Young Adult?" Specifically, she raises questions about middle school books (ages 10 to 14) competing with high school aged books, especially when it comes to ALA awards.
Go on over and leave your opinion; Mitali mentions mostly YALSA books; those of you who are involved with ALSC, do you think that those awards cover the 10 to 14 group? Or are the 10 to 14 year old readers and books in a "monkey in the middle" situation, too old for the J section and not old enough for most of the YA books out there?
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I really want more book bloggers to recognize the middle school category. That's why I don't say 'middle grade' or 'MG' as much as other people do -- I prefer to say juvenile fiction or teen fiction if we're breaking the children's full-length fiction department into general halves, but better still, I prefer to say elementary school, middle school, and high school. If you want to go past those thirds, though, I will: early elementary school, late elementary school, then ages 8 to 12, ages 10 to 13, ages 12 and up, and ages 16 and up.
http://slayground.livejournal.com/158677.html
Expanded at my own blog :)
I love conversations like this because it forces me to really think about terms, what I mean, and what I say.
I think I may start doing more Middle School/ High School labels. But the benefit of "middle grade" is (in my head, at least!) it includes 5th and 6th graders; and while I know of some middle schools that include 6th grade, I don't know any that includes 5th.
Also, as I think about this, I also feel "middle grade" is for those novels that are beyond easy reader.
Sigh. Labels are both good and bad...
"Middle" itself is such a middling word. ;-)
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