While Junior Grace Pearson turned the page on English class book “Wuthering Heights” by Emily Bronte, she wondered how long she would be able to enjoy it before the class moved on. 

“I feel that you don’t get the necessary information when you don’t get to finish the book,” Pearson said.

Tenth-grade English Honors and AP Language and Composition teacher Tamara Reis said she will stop teaching books if she feels that the class is not enjoying the book, such as when she taught “Wuthering Heights” last year.

“I don’t know if [all the students] noticed, but the class was not enjoying that book,” Reis said. “[To continue was] like [eating a plate of food that you do not like.] Don’t. Eat something else.”

Seventh grade ELA and high school Yearbook teacher Jodie Capron tries to teach two books a school year.

“I tend to dive deep into the books, [this] amount [is what] I’m comfortable with,” Capron said

Capron said that she will speed up the book if she feels that students are not enjoying the book.

“Teaching is a performance art,” Capron said. “There’s a lot of give or take in a classroom and if you’re paying attention you can see that. Now I’m not saying that if kids don’t like a book, I’m just going to give it up. It doesn’t work like that, because sometimes the ones that we don’t like are the ones that we most need to read.”

Reis has advice for students who don’t get to finish the book in class.

“If you want to finish that book, my suggestion is to borrow a copy and finish it privately,” Reis said. “But if a teacher feels that their class isn’t engaged, they should move on and I’d really like that message to get out there. Otherwise, people can grow up with a dislike of reading.”

Reis said she feels her classes usually finish the book.

“If we can’t finish the book, it is because we’ve run out of time,” Reis said. “But there are some books we need to read, like how everyone needs to read Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet” in eighth or ninth grade.”

Pearson said she has other methods to finishing books that are not finished in class.

“If we can’t finish the book in class, usually I’ll just read the SparkNotes for the books instead,” Pearson said. “Or I’ll finish it on my own time, whichever I have time for.”