my imagination asking questions like how
about or why can’t we just in comic
books have been a perfect vehicle for my
imaginations journey I mean why wouldn’t
they be comics have brought us
characters like Superman and better yet
comics can ask questions like what would
happen if Superman crash-landed in
communist Russia instead of America how
would that have affected his godlike
powers I started reading comics at the
age of seven we would stop at the bakery
after church on Sundays and while my mom
was waiting in line I’d walk a few doors
down to the drugstore and pick up the
latest issue of GI Joe or transformers
from the spinner rack in high school I
avoided traditional assigned texts like
Romeo and Juliet or To Kill a
Mockingbird and instead would read bloom
County and Calvin and Hobbes in bed at
night as a middle school teacher I used
comics not only to reinforce literacy
skills for my students but also to
develop relationships with marginalized
students that also didn’t care about
Romeo and Juliet after that I was
invited to help start a nonprofit called
pop culture classroom where we used
comics as a tool to ignite a love of
learning for all students I’ve seen
comics have a powerful educational
effect and help students become better
readers including myself my love of
comics and education has also
transformed my wife’s classroom here in
a English Spanish bilingual fifth grade
classroom in Boulder Colorado and
recently she told me a story about a
student of hers named Miguel
Miguel’s warm smile and and gentle heart
didn’t help the fact that he was
struggling as a reader at the beginning
of fifth grade he was barely reading at
a third-grade level but just a few weeks
ago at Miguel’s parent-teacher
conference my wife shared that Miguel
was now reading at nearly a sixth grade
level
filled with pride my wife turned to
Miguel and said what was it that ignited
this spark for you that that fostered
this love of reading
Miguel’s broad smile beamed and he
looked down and said ghosts it’s just so
good ghost is a graphic novel or a
long-form comic book about a family
truly learning to live in the face of a
daughter’s impending death from cystic
fibrosis earlier in the year Miguel had
purchased his own copy of ghosts with
money he had scraped together and read
it over and over again at recess on the
playground during reading time in school
on the bus home at home over and over
again fostered by a comic book this
newfound love of reading combined with
regular reading instruction from his
teachers helped Miguel achieve this
remarkable growth but Miguel’s story is
not unique
take for example Dave pinky the New York
Times bestselling author Dave grew up
dyslexic unable to read until he
realized that comic books helped bridge
that gap for him so he started reading
creating comic books now he authors the
books called Captain Underpants who
fights against villains called professor
peepee poopypants I just said that on a
TED stage
so on the other end of the spectrum we
have Charles R Schwab the co-chairman of
Charles Schwab incorporated also
dyslexic Charles Schwab turned to
graphic novel adaptations of classics
like A Tale of Two Cities in order to
complete his assignments and support his
growth as a reader before we move on
let’s establish a common understanding
of what a comic book actually is a comic
is simply a story told through
sequential images and here we see a
perfect example of that the text the
images in the implied passage of time
all work together to tell an evocative
story comics are a natural expression of
the human experience because all of us
think in both words and pictures and in
fact the first recorded instance of
sequential art is 20,000 years old seen
with the cave paintings and last goal
France here we see the overlapping art
the imagery used to possibly foretell
the tribes coming hunting success or
maybe just honor the animals that they
live among and cherish and depend on
cultures from ancient Egypt to the Maya
use pictographic art to tell their
stories and histories in the 1700s when
the printing press became ubiquitous
authors started using text and even
speech balloons to communicate their
stories
and comics quickly became the format to
comment on and both satirize the
political and social scenes of the day
in the early 1900’s the comic-book
format that we’re still familiar with
today became popular now admittedly when
we look at today’s comics they do have a
goofy side their supernatural heroes and
fantastic storylines they can they can
be a little bit goofy
his superpower is literally that he can
remove his arm and use it as a weapon
gross and also a little bit confusing
because what happens when he needs to
remove the second arm how does he do
that and also what happens after he
removes it how does he actually use it
as a weapon still trying to figure that
out the other side of comics today’s
comics is that they have a tremendously
powerful and beautiful art form the
different medium that’s used the stories
that are told all transform readers take
them on emotional journeys another way
of today’s comics are powerful
educational tools is by tackling themes
that we all deal with in some form or
another themes like dealing with
personal identity and self-discovery
feelings of other Ness
isolation or depression and even the
consequences of childhood gang
involvement comics echo the human
experience by providing the connective
tissue between logic and beauty this
connection between logic and beauty
between story and art is one of the
reasons why comic books are so popular
from kids all the way through adults but
it’s important to note that school and
public librarians regularly report that
comics and graphic novels are their
highest circulating collections even
more than their DVDs and as teachers are
starting to realize comics possess
superhuman potential not just on the
class not just on the page but also in
their classrooms the contextual images
provided with combined with the short
bursts of text all work together to
support student text decoding as well as
reading comprehension so students
understand what it is they’re reading
study after study goes on to show that
comics improves student engagement
reading comprehension vocabulary
development and on and on
and on another reason I want to talk
about why comics are such powerful
educational resources is that they
inspire multiple readings let’s go back
to that student who was struggling for
example and say maybe he couldn’t
understand the text at first while
reading this comic so he chooses just to
focus on the images allowing the
pictures and to establish a storytelling
mode the storytelling sequence in his
mind so he’s a sense of what the story’s
about he enjoys and appreciates and
takes in the artwork then his second
reading he goes back and just focuses on
the text allowing that visual
understanding to help him decode and
figure out complex words that he
couldn’t get the first time around the
subsequent reading might spend time in
the gutter which is not what you think
it’s actually the space and time
in-between panels what happens when we
move from one image to the next there is
that implied passage of time it’s fun to
just spend time thinking about what goes
from one panel to the next and the
subsequent reading final reading might
spend time integrating all aspects
images text gutter storyline in 2013 I
learned that due to the economic
downturn the Colorado State was cutting
funding for education in correctional
facilities after hearing this my mind
started to wander
I thought about comics not just as a
powerful educational tool that I had
been using for decade but also as an
escape as a way out it didn’t take me
long to see the need and the connection
over 70% of inmates that interact with
the correctional system are functionally
illiterate unable to read past the third
grade level fill out a job application
or even read a court summons that tells
them when they’re supposed to show up
for parole hearing
what’s more penal institution records go
to show that literacy education provided
during incarceration goes to reduce
recidivism rates which is when a
surprisingly recidivism rates dropped
from 70% to 16%
when GED level literacy education is
provided during incarceration and what’s
more art programs provided during
incarceration have been shown to not
only decrease aggression but increase
compassion and empathy for the
participants as well the US Department
of Justice states that the link between
academic failure and delinquency
violence and crime is welded to reading
failure
unfortunately reading ability has become
a prime indicator of success or failure
for today’s children and in today’s
America inability to read all too often
leads to prison the US Department of
Education released a study that shows
that two-thirds of all students unable
to read at grade level by the end of
third grade that’s eight years old
unable to read a grade level by the end
of third grade will wind up in jail or
on welfare what’s even worse is that
private prison companies which are
publicly funded with your tax dollars
are now researching third grade literacy
scores and finding out which communities
have the lowest literacy scores to find
out where to build their next facilities
insuring the highest population of
inmates and profits so I thought why
don’t we try comics behind bars the
inviting storyline characters that art
all of it the educational resource it
fits this powerful need after months and
months of researching need and securing
funding and hiring teachers finding a
welcoming facility here at Boulder
County Jail in Boulder Colorado we were
ready to start shortly after we began
I visited my teachers one day when they
were teaching a class in the women’s
side of the jail I walked in and the
heavy door clangs behind me and I was
scared I didn’t know what to expect what
I was going to see or hear or encounter
I was escorted to a small classroom with
cinderblock walls and low ceilings and
harsh fluorescent lights the women filed
in clad and loose-fitting beige clothes
and laceless shoes they had their
folders and they had their books in hand
and I also noticed that they were
wearing smiles they were excited to be
there the first part of the class was no
different than the book clubs I had run
hundreds of times in my middle school
class before we were chatting about a
book called star gazing dog it’s a
graphic novel about a sick man who had
become estranged from his family for
various reasons and the women were
having this powerful conversation going
back and forth some were arguing that he
was a good father others said he wasn’t
why was his only relation to his best
relationship with the dog and not his
daughter
but he provided he brought home food and
water and money and they could go on
trip and and and these women were going
back and forth and during this
conversation I noticed that for a time
these inmates these women had been set
free after switching to the jaylee
drawing lesson the women began
illustrating their comics most were
chatting while sketching but Amanda was
singularly focused on her eight and a
half by 11 copy paper intent on creating
a universe with her pencil and paper I
left her at it for quite a while until
another woman accidentally bumped demand
his chair on her way to the pencil
sharpener startled Amanda blinked and
looked up and she proclaimed oh I
silently she returned to her work even
though her body was captive behind a
steel door her mind had been set free
through the pages of her comic it turns
out that Amanda was writing a comic
about healthy eating habits for her
kindergarten daughter on the outside you
see Amanda had learned about healthy
eating habits through another class
another program in jail and she wanted
to share that idea with her daughter
three super peas in a pod
battled it out against the bad french
fries in teaching this logical idea of
healthy eating
despite their captivity and stressful
lives these inmates are learning not
only do they write and illustrate
powerful stories but their literacy
skills are improving as well over the
nearly two years of teaching inmates and
correctional facilities we’ve seen a
statistically significant increase in
their storytelling ability and a 60
percent increase in their comics
specific vocabulary learning is taking
place
comics are the vehicle the act of
learning is an inherently vulnerable
activity to learn one must step outside
of their comfort zone and risk failure
accepting that risk requires a safe
learning environment and as you can all
understand demonstrating vulnerability
in any classroom is a threatening and
scary step yet today you’ve seen that
even in the crucible of jails comics
have proven to be a valuable and
effective educational tool through their
less intimidating format with contextual
blocks of imagery and associated words
comics can transform and invite readers
into this culture of literacy we need to
stop thinking of comics as low
literature but instead is a powerful art
form that echoes the human experience
capable of transforming education
you [Applause]