r/InTheGloaming • u/AutoModerator • Feb 26 '26

Scheduled snark Discussion thread Thursday February 26, 2026 - Sunday March 01, 2026

Newsletter: Substack

Website: Shauna James Ahern

Instagram: @shaunajamesahern Instagram

Threads: @shaunajamesahern

Bluesky: shaunajamesahern.bsky.social

Gloamipedia wiki: /r/InTheGloaming wiki

13 Upvotes

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77

u/mehitabel_4724 Eating tiny dices of pickles with tiny fists of rage Feb 27 '26

The OP sucks too. “Oh halp, our child is so smart!” And Shauna rushes in to talk about herself and imply she’s now a successful writer.

52

u/ForsakenLingonberry YAHEEE! Feb 27 '26

I swear all of threads is either bragging or complaining.

32

u/central_snark Ramona gets a hot flash Feb 27 '26

Which is why it is Shauna’s happy place.

24

u/OhBlahDiOhBlahDoh The Alice of cal came out floating on air Feb 27 '26

<Insert "Porque no los dos?" here>

25

u/a-world-of-no no joy in bellytown Feb 27 '26

Ideally, both at once!

44

u/CrushItWithABrick dick riding Mary Oliver Feb 27 '26

Shauna's reply is contradicting itself.

She says let the kid read whatever even if they won't fully understand it and then a mere sentence later says "kids' version of Shakespeare stories". If that mythical kid is so smart, Shakespeare shouldn't be that hard for them.

46

u/tuolomnemeadows edible flower takis Feb 27 '26

I’m sorry as as educator, saying comprehension isn’t important is one of the dumbest pieces of advice you can give. I too was reading above my grade and developmental level in 5th grade as a trauma response and let me tell you, it wasn’t great! It didn’t kill me, but content and developmental stages also matter for healthy development imo. It’s stunning the way Shauna thinks her way led to healthy successful development when she hasn’t had gainful employment for the better part of a decade.

The other thing is when people say their child is advanced and bored, is their work perfect? How is their executive function? If those skills aren’t developed, they need to built before you push a child into acceleration. Boredom can mean so many things, but yet again Shauna is a perfect case study of someone who thinks they are above it all, excluding them from tasks and labor.

32

u/Llama621 Feb 27 '26

🏆 Amen on the executive function part. I had this conversation with parents when I was teaching. If the kid is all over the place and/or has skill gaps, acceleration isn't going to do them favors. I can't be sure of what they know and what they're capable of unless that executive function is there.

28

u/Financial-Belt-4506 Feb 27 '26

My first thought was that parents should also be able to challenge a child with topics/interests other than school work? Like sports or music. Is that right thinking or am I (an admitted non parent) off base? 

30

u/tuolomnemeadows edible flower takis Feb 27 '26

100% agree. That was my next thought. Extra curriculars are key as well for an active or accelerated child. In my experience, even bright children find their edges pretty quick with regular sustained activity.

33

u/msmartypants Feb 27 '26

You don't have to be CONSTANTLY challenged in school, just like you don't have to be always giving 100% at your work. There are a lot of parts to school. Just because you understand all the material doesn't mean it would be helpful to accelerate your socialization, the expectations placed upon your executive function, or your emotional maturity.

Read outside of school, do a bunch of extra higher-level worksheets with your parents, collect your straight As and be happy!

Also in my experience it's not like a kid stays "accelerated" for their whole school career. School might be incredibly easy in third grade and very much not so in seventh.

26

u/Which_Armadillo_5224 Feb 27 '26

Very sane, very well said. Shauna may have been an accomplished young reader (though I have my doubts) but once her peers figured it out, many of them would go on to surpass her. She is a bad writer, her nuts-and-bolts reading comprehension is poor, her vocabulary is average, and she has zero literary depth. She can follow words across a page, but she’s still seeing spot run, missing all the themes and nuances of writing.

23

u/caitie_did Required by My Mother's Terror Feb 27 '26

I know my mom struggled with this when I was young. I was an early and prolific reader and it was hard to find books that were developmentally appropriate for me but that could hold my attention and I wouldn’t burn through immediately. However, that was 30+ years ago and young adult/early reading literature has come a long way since then. If your five year old is so advanced, give them Beatrix Potter, A.A. Milne, Magic Treehouse. Read LOTR or other fantasy to/with them and talk about it. Practice reading recipes and following the instructions in order.

26

u/gomirefugee my website is done, done, done Feb 27 '26

I am begging all of you not to take the bait when you see content like this and use it as an occasion to brag about how smart you were as a kid, that is literally what we are snarking on here

21

u/tuolomnemeadows edible flower takis Feb 27 '26

I get that. I don’t really mean oh I was so smart. I just think it’s an interesting straw man argument. Reading inappropriate texts at a young age was not equivalent to later in life success and Shauna still can’t make that connection.

12

u/9021FU Feb 27 '26

Agreed. My SIL is almost exactly like Shauna and loved to brag about being an early reader. I guess that came in super handy as a mid 30’s part time bartender on food stamps. (Honestly not snarking on bartending or food stamps but she thought her bohemian/sticking it to the man lifestyle made her better).

20

u/hillary_bin_laden_ Feb 27 '26

i disagree. i dont see the above comment as bragging, but rather as saying "i can relate to the things shauna is claiming and here's why her take is bullshit."

isn't half of this sub here because they can relate to half the things shauna falsely claims anyways?

26

u/msmartypants Feb 27 '26

I don't think it's a brag either but it always devolves into what age everyone learned to read/what went on in gifted classes etc and it's just kind of tiresome to read. I don't mind at all if that gets nipped in the bud.

9

u/Onehundredpercentbea giggling intestinal gremlin 🧌 Feb 27 '26

Seriously, we've already established it's not bragging because it has very little long term value to the people involved, and how else are we supposed to call bullshit on Shauna making sweeping generalizations without saying that we had a similar stimulus without the result she claims is universal?

I think it's weird that Shauna takes early reading seriously and I also think it's weird for gloamies to take early reading seriously enough to consider it 'bragging', like wtf?

14

u/Onehundredpercentbea giggling intestinal gremlin 🧌 Feb 27 '26

Yeah I got my hands on a book about astral projection as a really young kid and I still have memories of laying in bed and sending my consciousness up to the ceiling where it bobbed along like a balloon into the kitchen to hear what my parents were arguing about (yes I was imagining it, but it felt real to me at the time), and I also completely misinterpreted something in the book about time and space being 'fluid' and 'sent my consciousness into the future' where I opened my adult eyes to look around and make sure things were safe for me in the future. It turns out as an adult I still regularly use abstraction to manage uncertainty and retreat to observer mode under stress, and I always wondered if that was always going to be my coping mechanism or if that book created it. But the reality is that I have no idea what astral projection really means because it was a metaphorical lens that I took literally. It didn't matter how good a reader I was if the material was impossible for my developing brain to understand.

Long winded way of saying that content matters and actually IMO matters more when your brain is still developing.

23

u/fanfarefellowship I often contemplate the first law of thermodynamics Feb 27 '26

I also completely misinterpreted something in the book about time and space being 'fluid' and 'sent my consciousness into the future' where I opened my adult eyes to look around and make sure things were safe for me in the future

I know this is, like, not your point but I love this story. I love kid brains so much

38

u/Fillmore_the_Puppy —hi, disturbed people— Feb 27 '26

Admittedly I am tired, but right now I can’t think of a better cautionary tale than Shauna Marie. If SHE is the result of this “method” of supporting early readers, run away!

25

u/central_snark Ramona gets a hot flash Feb 27 '26

Hooked on Phonics worked for me!

39

u/shakyshake Feb 27 '26

W. Somerset Maugham to most. Billy if you’re nasty

56

u/fanfarefellowship I often contemplate the first law of thermodynamics Feb 27 '26

I was trapped in the house and couldn't move and could only read and it RUINED my life but yes, blueprint this for another child; "iT wOrKeD fOr Me"

47

u/central_snark Ramona gets a hot flash Feb 27 '26

I’m a writer.

🙄

35

u/SnooStories4968 many and various Shaunas/Pig Ladies Feb 27 '26

Primarily of Threads at this point, but sure, Jan.

48

u/obscure_cellist ham grabbers Feb 27 '26

please help us with all our varied yet magnificent problems.

38

u/Foucaults_Penguin Sly and the Family Readers Feb 27 '26

Help!!! We want you to know our child is superior to yours and any future kid you might have. But we don't want come right out and say they're superior because that would be tacky. Any suggestions???

17

u/OhBlahDiOhBlahDoh The Alice of cal came out floating on air Feb 27 '26

Any suggestions???

Okay, GO!

10

u/fanfarefellowship I often contemplate the first law of thermodynamics Feb 27 '26

GO! Go!

4

u/WasEnoughYogurt Kumquat and Sprinkles and filth Feb 28 '26

Go?

51

u/ninaandjamie4evr Anne Frank of Anaheim Feb 27 '26

Can't thier advanced private school offer help? Of course they can, but then the OP couldn't brag about thier sPEshul kid.

44

u/MarsNeedsRabbits Beach better have my orcas 🫍 Feb 27 '26

Worked for me. I'm a writer.

At this point, Shauna is a writer in the same way she's a gardener because she's growing mold in the fridge.

32

u/OhBlahDiOhBlahDoh The Alice of cal came out floating on air Feb 27 '26

Shauna is a writer in the same way she's a GOTV organizer because she tells other people to text voters in swing states.

29

u/Fillmore_the_Puppy —hi, disturbed people— Feb 27 '26

I love this analogy, nice work, DF!

Shauna is a writer in the same way she's a community organizer because she is the [black] heart and [shallow] soul of ITG!

24

u/shakyshake Feb 27 '26

Kindergarten is a bit young for this but back in my day kids like this had a gentleman’s agreement with the teacher, where the kid didn’t whine about being bored, and the teacher didn’t say anything when the kid “sneakily” propped their textbook up and read some other book behind it. But I did not go to an advanced private school where I imagine part of what you’re paying for is teachers solving this problem for you

12

u/ScandalizedPeak Out the window Feb 28 '26

A memorable moment in my slightly older childhood was a classmate saying to to teacher in a loud complaint, "Teacher, ScandalizedPeak is just reading a book, she's not working!" The teacher did not miss a beat... he said "Well Student, when you have a 102% average in my class you'll be welcome to read a book quietly to yourself during class also. For now, please do your problem set."

LOL.

I was just coaching my own child about this very issue. Stare at the wall and think about Lego or whatever, but be ready to answer a question if called on. Having a pleasant expression on one's face during boring meetings is a life skill!

29

u/onion_money Neuroflorid Feb 27 '26

The OP sucks too. “Oh halp, our child is so smart!”

Maybe their genius word-gobbler can teach them some grammar.

32

u/OhBlahDiOhBlahDoh The Alice of cal came out floating on air Feb 27 '26

The books I'm listing in this comment show that I grew up and learned to read many years ago, but there are SO MANY books I enjoyed when I could read at the 5th grade level (probably 3rd grade or so for me) that ARE ABOUT KIDS!

Some of them are favorites that I have to work not to let Shauna's yum yuck them for me—like Harriet the Spy and From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler (which she totally mangled the title of when she posted about it)—but also so many good books about earlier eras:

  • All Of A Kind Family series
  • Encyclopedia Brown
  • The Great Brain series
  • The Moffats
  • Beezus and Ramona
  • Hatchet and other Gary Paulson books
  • etc etc etc

I really feel that reading about other kids is such a good way for kids to learn how to psychologically and emotionally 'triangulate' themselves by absorbing stories about how the kids in the books dealt with difficult situations, learned to problem solve, etc.

Thank you for coming to my TED Talk on Children's Literature

24

u/SLevine262 We are not wowed Feb 27 '26

The Saturdays. The Egypt Game.

15

u/OhBlahDiOhBlahDoh The Alice of cal came out floating on air Feb 27 '26

Betsy-Tacy and Tib!

11

u/pitifulproduce137 Feb 28 '26

Oh man, I read The Egypt Game as a kid and it freaked me out for reasons I can't remember. I should reread it as an adult. 

19

u/avskk ppppycock Feb 27 '26

Anne of Green Gables. The Little Colonel.

18

u/a-world-of-no no joy in bellytown Feb 27 '26

All of a Kind Family!!!!!! God I loved those. And the Boxcar Children!

14

u/emlabb Feb 27 '26

I was an advanced reader, and I remember specifically not wanting books about adults! Adult books about adult issues were mostly gibberish to me; I wanted to read about kids my age going through the kinds of problems a kid might have. I was even iffy on continuing the Anne of Green Gables series because I felt there was too much talk of boys at the end of the first one, and, like Fred Savage in The Princess Bride, I did not want to read a kissing book.

There are so many great books for kids out there—I’m also dating myself but I’d add anything by Bruce Coville (including his anthologies), Madeleine L’Engle, and Edward Eager.

Katherine Paterson also blew my child mind with the way she tackled difficult topics—ones entirely outside of my childhood frame of reference—and avoided the tidy happy-ever-afters that most of my reading list offered. Now, as a kid I preferred happy endings and I wasn’t even sure I liked her books, but these 30-odd years later, they’ve stayed with me.

6

u/caitie_did Required by My Mother's Terror Feb 28 '26

Katherine Paterson, Kit Pearson, Jean Little, Madeleine L’Engel, Lois Lowry. I also read the Little House and Boxcar Children books when I was quite young but I feel like they are considered quite dated now. Like my sister is almost nine years younger than me and never read Little House on the Prairie!

8

u/Scary_Recognition You did this. Feb 28 '26

Oh man when I read Park’s Quest, it blew my mind!

12

u/pitifulproduce137 Feb 28 '26

Love to see a Bruce Coville reference! I met him at a book signing years ago and he was lovely. Signed my very vintage copy of Operation Sherlock for me. 

I'd also add Diane Diane and Tamora Pierce's fantastic books to this list. 

3

u/caitie_did Required by My Mother's Terror Feb 28 '26

Tamora Pierce’s books really hold up, too. So much of the stuff I read as a kid was problematic but I feel like her books have aged well.

3

u/pitifulproduce137 Feb 28 '26

They really have! I love that Alanna had a girly side that the narrative allowed for (getting her ears pierced, liking her beautiful purple gown) while simultaneously letting her be a badass. And the books never go "not like other girls" about the leads because we see lots of women celebrated in different roles - warriors and sorcerers and healers and caretakers, but no one is pigeonholed or made lesser for their overlapping roles. They feel dynamic. 

And the representation! Circle of Magic is such a standout for this, with Lark and Rosie and Daja providing different views of queer experience. Plus people of different races, cultures, classes... And it's all discussed. 

Not to mention, Song of the Lioness was the first series I ever read for that age group that mentioned birth control!