And Now, a Public Service Announcement from Rick Riordan

I really, really get it. Those movies were horrible. Even so, isn’t this a cool problem to have?

This was so good I’m reproducing it in full from Mr. Riordan’s blog:

Dear Teacher,

Hi! I am so grateful that you are teaching Greek mythology to your kids and maybe reading my books with them. I hope it goes well! If you want some lesson plan ideas I have a ton of free stuff on my website, mostly pulled from my own fifteen years as a middle school teacher.

Now a plea: Please, for the love of multiple intelligences, DON’T show those “Percy Jackson” movies (ironic quotes intentional) in your classroom for a compare-contrast lesson or, gods forbid, a “reward” at the end of your unit. No group of students deserves to be subjected to that sort of mind-numbing punishment. The movies’ educational value is exactly zero. A better use of classroom time would be . . . well, pretty much anything, including staring at the second hand of the clock for fifty minutes or having a locker clean-out day.

If you need a break and are using the movie so you can have time to grade papers, hey, I totally get that. I was a teacher for a long time! May I suggest Clash of the Titans, or the cheesy old 1960s version of Jason and the Argonauts, or heck, even the animated Hercules from Disney, as bad as it is. Those movies have plenty of things to compare and contrast with the actual Greek myths. But my heart breaks every time I hear that classroom time is being thrown away watching those vapid Percy Jackson adaptations.

Maybe the kids want to watch them on their own. Fine. Whatever. Personally, I would rather have my teeth pulled with no anesthesia, but to each his or her own. Spending class time time on those movies, though? I’ve justified a lot of things in my years as a teacher. Once I did a barbecue pit sacrifice of prayers to the Greek gods with my sixth graders. Once I taught the kids a traditional Zulu game by rolling watermelons down a hill and spearing them with broomsticks. We took fencing classes when we studied Shakespeare, reenacted the entire Epic of Gilgamesh, and, yes, we watched some pretty great movies from time to time. But I can think of zero justification for watching the adaptations of my books as part of a school curriculum. (And please, don’t call them my movies. They are in no way mine.)

Thanks for listening. I hope you have a great school year. I hope your kids get excited about reading. And I hope you’ll consider this author’s plea. The kids don’t need classroom time to learn that movies can be really, really bad. They’ll find that out on their own!

Yours truly,

Rick Riordan

Percy Jackson’s Greek Heroes

Apparently a companion piece to Percy Jackson’s Greek Gods will be arriving next summer. According to Rick Riordan,

During the Blood of Olympus tour, we announced Percy Jackson’s Greek Heroes, which will be published on Percy’s birthday, Aug. 18, 2015. This is very much like Greek Gods, except about (you guessed it) the Greek heroes like Hercules, Theseus, Atalanta, Perseus, Orpheus, and all the rest. Filled with Percy’s snark and sass. Illustrated with full-color art by John Rocco. So heavy you won’t be able to lift it. Yes, it will be awesome!

So, there you go.

Movie Review: Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief

Christine Amsden’s bottom line is near the top of her review: A good movie for an eight-year-old. For anybody else, maybe not so much.

The Ophiotaurus

The most recent installment of Faith M. Broughan’s series on monsters in Greek mythology focuses on the Ophiotaurus. There is only one extant reference to this creature in all of Greco-Roman literature, but it does feature prominently in The Titan’s Curse by Rick Riordan.