What's your opinion on Sparknotes?

submitted by Shockwave from self.books

Back in my days of high school, a teacher forced us to read The Scarlet Letter. I read that thing from front to back, even took notes to help me understand better.

Turns out the teacher used Sparknotes quiz because she figured everyone would use sparknotes instead of actually read it. I got an F despite having 13 pages of notes. That made sparknotes leave a sour taste in my mouth.

Did you ever find it useful?

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[–][deleted] 3 insightful - 2 fun3 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 2 fun -  (0 children)

I also didn't like it. It felt like a way for people to skip all the work. Luckily our teacher did quizzes so that plot didn't affect your mark, and you had to actually read the book to understand.

[–]rdh2121 3 insightful - 2 fun3 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 2 fun -  (0 children)

I think Sparknotes is fine, for the most part, and you just had a terrible teacher.

The problem with Sparknotes is that it's myopic by design, and intended to only convey the mainstream interpretations of a given text. Teachers should be aware of what Sparknotes has to say, but teaching from Sparknotes does a disservice to students.

[–]PurpleAmathea 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

I have definitely found sparknotes useful as a quick reference when I want to look things up, or as better than nothing when I hate a book too much to actually read it, but what your teacher did is nuts, sorry that happened to you.

[–]humanist_halberdier 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Back in high school my teacher did the opposite, she gave a surprise quiz that only someone who actually read the book could answer (a different quiz for each of the eight books one could pick for that month's book report). She then got super depressed that so many of her "good" students were caught cheating. Personally, I would read the book a month before the book report is due but would procrastinate on writing the book report so I would use a Sparknotes-alternative to remind myself what the characters names and certain plot details were although I usually ignored any of its "analysis" (e.g. themes in the novel) which I usually thought was pure bullshit from having read the book.

[–]asterias 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

I believe that noone should be forced to read an entire book. It destroys the joy of reading literature. So if you don't feel like reading a specific book. Sparknotes can be handy.