This Friday I am the "mystery reader" for my son's 4th grade class. As the title suggests, I have about 20 minutes to read basically anything of my choosing. I'd love to hear any age appropriate suggestions that are other than what you might imagine parents choose for something like this. Two ideas I've had so far: Dawkins letter to his 10 year old daughter (already vetoed by the teacher - this one I felt compelled to get prior approval), and one of the dialogs from Godel Escher Bach (maybe Contrafactus?) the "geek-by-association" from which would probably fade by high school in time for him still to be able to date...<p>Anyway, from those two examples, you get the gist of my nefarious intent. Any ideas? Any of PGs essays work for 10 year olds?
> Dawkins letter to his 10 year old daughter (already vetoed by the teacher - this one I felt compelled to get prior approval)<p>Why would that get vetoed ?<p>It seems like an excellent choice.<p>How about Feinmans story about how his dad would talk to him about 'small things' by pretending he was very small ?<p>Another alternative, a bit from The Planiverse by AK Dewdney ?
I had an opportunity to do something like this last year.<p>I picked a passage from The World Without Us, talking about how all the plastic that we use ends up in the ocean.<p>10 year old kids are old enough to understand environmental issues.
it would probably also get vetoed for many reasons, but i still love this story:<p><a href="http://www.multivax.com/last_question.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.multivax.com/last_question.html</a>
"Guts" by Chuck Palahniuk<p>That one is probably way, way too graphic, but if your intent is to subvert...you might even go with something from Hunter S. Thompson, Fear and Loathing perhaps?