After years of education experience, I understand what we as educators want, and this book will provide those in education with:

The overall goal of this book is to open the minds of educators to the use of comics as meaningful and engaging literature that help all levels of readers. Comics are societal artifacts, a break from the textbook, and a way to engage our 21st-century globally diverse society. Again, this will be reached by the sharing of my own personal experiences and successes in specific lessons and the offer to continue the conversation even after finishing the book.

My journey with comics as literacy really goes back to my childhood days of reading comics in my bedroom and getting lost in all the amazing stories. Superheroes resonate with all of us and are our modern mythology, much like those of the Greeks and Romans. When my bedroom door was shut, I became Batman, Spider-Man, Superman—these were heroes who were able to overcome difficult circumstances and still go on to save the world. The X-Men were outcasts from society, loners who were ridiculed, bullied, and often cut off from their families. Yet they were able to overcome their biological family issues by joining a new family who accepted them and showed them love. They were able to defend the earth from many monsters, including isolation. Growing up, I was also able to make a connection to my own hero, my father. I saw him as a superhero when I saw him put on his Philadelphia police uniform and go out each day to save the world. I heard stories of him rescuing people from burning buildings, saving children from horrible circumstances, and ridding the world of bad guys, and for me that brought comics to life. Even now, as an adult, comics still serve this purpose for me as I struggle with events in my childhood, my anxiety, and bouts of depression. I can still see myself in these heroes, and I know many others feel the same.

While my love for comics never waned, as a beginning teacher, these books were not included in my classroom lessons. I did not decorate my classroom with superhero posters, nor did I have any comic books in sight. This would make my current students laugh as my current classroom library overflows with comics, graphic novels, posters, and more. When I began my journey as a teacher, I felt as though I needed to prove myself as an academic and promptly filled my room with traditional resources and literature. I would not even have imagined using comics as I was trapped in the misconception that I currently rail against—comics are just for kids, they are just capes and tights, and they are not literature. However, my professional journey changed due to several fortuitous events culminating in a serious moment when I considered leaving teaching. However, it was the decision to fully integrate my passion for comics and Hip Hop into my teaching that literally saved me and made me, in a powerful sense, a new teacher all over again. I reexamined my content and resources and wondered how to change what I did to make the lessons more engaging, more cross-curricular, more skills-based, and more fun for the students and me. Now, I get to travel the country giving professional development on comics in education and get to share my ideas. Like many educators, I once thought I was “just a teacher”—I never thought that others would care much about what I did and thought sharing my ideas in a blog or through other means would just come off as bragging. Luckily, I had several people in my life who encouraged me to share through Twitter, Instagram, and blogging about my classroom experiences, and everything changed. I hope to encourage you to do the same because what we do in our classrooms is important. We need YOUR voice to help shape the conversation about what education truly is and inspire the next generation of educators.

My love for comics was unexpected, given the academic credibility I needed when I decided to obtain my Master’s Degree as a Reading Specialist at Gwynedd Mercy University. I was the only male teacher in the program and one of only two secondary/content area teachers. Many expressed surprise that a high school social studies teacher would be undertaking a Reading Specialist program as reading is generally thought to be a skill taught in elementary school or, at higher levels, more fit for Language Arts class. However, I firmly believe that all educators are teachers of reading and that analytical reading and writing are the utmost important skills. I believe that all classrooms need to have libraries and that we all need to model reading for our students, share what we read, and share HOW we read. In this university program, I was repeatedly shown studies that showed boys don’t read as much as girls, nor do they read as deeply. Yet growing up, my public library card was my most prized possession, and I loved reading and simply could not personally identify with this educational research. According to these studies, it wasn’t just that boys weren’t reading, but males of all ages. I listened to some of the other elementary teachers in my program as they discussed similar issues in their classrooms of boys not reading. I began to ask questions, the most important being, what are you giving these boys to read? When some of the classroom titles were being shared by these teachers, an idea began to form in my head. I did not enjoy reading many of those titles in school either. I shuddered as I remembered reading Anna Karenina in high school. My English teacher was an amazing educator and did all he could to make the book come to life for us, but it just didn’t click with me. As the weeks went on in his class, it really became a drag on my love of reading. Remembering this experience, I began to wonder if comics might be a possible answer. From my own personal experiences, I knew that there were meaningful stories, full of plot twists, mystery, high-level vocabulary, and so much in comics that perhaps others did not yet know about.

I brought my ideas to my professors at Gwynedd Mercy University. I was afraid of being scoffed at, but these open-minded professors found the idea to be as exciting as I did. I will be forever grateful as I began to excitedly research the efficacy of comic books in the classroom. There was not a lot of information to be had at the time, and I had to work hard to find that information. However, it was a true passion project, and I read anything I could find on the topic, drew on my personal experiences, and also tested the waters a bit in my own classroom. I wrote up an entire program about using comics and pop culture to increase classroom engagement in literacy. I really had a funny thought as I presented my findings and defended my paper to a room full of educators: The younger version of me was a large part of this presentation and was excitedly cheering me on, albeit in disbelief. My presentation began with how I used a paragraph from my social studies classroom textbook about the Battle of Thermopylae. I paired this description with images from the graphic novel 300 by Frank Miller, another sample from the textbook on the 100 Years War, and finally images from the comic Crecy by Warren Ellis. The end result of this experiment was that my students were able to learn so much more about this battle through the intersection of comics and the textbook. They were excited and engaged at using this new medium. I would never propose that comics can replace more traditional resources, but they are able to enhance our lessons.

While the premise of my Reading Specialist paper focused on using comics to engage boys, it quickly became so much more. I am not of the belief that there are certain books for boys and others for girls—there are just good stories. There are so many great female leads in comics and stories that are great for many interests. I have found the same success using comics with all of my students, regardless of gender. When we created the comic book club in my high school, the founding officers were three amazing young women, all with impressive encyclopedic knowledge of comics and pop culture. As will be shown throughout this book, comics have long reflected society and have become ever more inclusive of all peoples.

My three children also eventually became part of my ongoing research of engaging readers as they have a deep and meaningful love of all things reading. However, for my son, Liam, this was not always the case. He was labeled a “reluctant reader” in kindergarten by his teacher as he did not want to read the phonics books he was being given. Let’s be honest, these books were unimaginative and left little chance to create excitement and engagement for any kid. As a family of readers who understand the critical importance of reading throughout life, his mother and I were obviously concerned. His teacher looked down on all things related to comics and thought his interest was interfering with his education. He began to act out a bit at school—even putting his hand out like Spider-Man and pretending to web his teacher at one point! He was already pigeon-holed as a struggling student and began to give up on school—I could see it happening before my eyes. I initially decided to double down and support the findings of this teacher and unfairly punished my son. I took away his superhero lunch box, school bag, and clothes. I told him he could earn them back by doing as his teacher said, by reading the books she wanted him to read. I now look back on this experience as something for which I will never be able to forgive myself as a parent or an educator. I should have known better as the evidence was clearly there to be seen. I thought of my own experience as a child and the research I had undertaken for my Reading Specialist degree. His teacher did not see any value in comics as literature, and her classroom was limited in both book options and decorations. My wife and I changed our approach with him, and I began to share my comics with Liam and buy him comics that were perfect for him. His love of reading, and confidence as a reader, almost immediately began to climb. We pulled all three of our kids out of this school as a result, and it was the right choice to make. My son now loves to read everything, not just comics. We need to keep this lesson in mind as parents and educators, just as I do in my classroom whenever possible. This is why I allow students to choose their own research topics, because I want them to be passionate about what they are researching—not just see learning through some assigned topic over which they will come to resent both me as a teacher and history as a discipline.

Despite my success in my graduate studies and with my own kids, a few years still passed before I really began to integrate comics into my class. It wasn’t until I was discussing the new Spider-Man, Miles Morales, in my classroom as a current event that it all came together. Miles Morales has an African-American father and a Puerto Rican mother and was part of an intentional movement in comics to increase representation. I had one particular African-American student perk up at my discussion, and he stayed after class to discuss this new comic. This was a student with whom I did not have a strong connection in the classroom. He was a great student, but we had not connected on a personal level. However, we now had something in common to talk about, so I began bringing in my comics to show him, and our conversations began to grow. This young man was more impressed that Spider-Man looked like him than President Obama! As a teacher, we are forever grateful for moments like these when we can make connections with students, and it was then that I knew that I was onto something. I was able to share a personal passion of mine, and I began to get even more excited to come into the classroom every day. I began showcasing other comics as societal artifacts and explaining how they reflect the changing society around us. This is what makes comics such a powerful classroom resource as they are true societal mirrors. New comics come out every Wednesday, and what happens in our society is often reflected in these stories.

While I began to excitedly reimagine my approach to education, I finally had THAT year as a teacher. Events transpired that made me question everything I was as a teacher and my future in education. I went into a depression and found it hard to go to work, just wanting to stay in bed with the covers over my head. I spoke things over with my wife and began looking into options for another career. It’s not that I no longer enjoyed teaching—I love being in the room with my students and count myself lucky to be in this profession. There were just too many outside things going on that were negatively impacting what was going on in my classroom. Then a real-life superhero came into my life, and I received a message from Vicky Pasquantonio, an editor from PBS Newshour. She had read my blog about connecting with students through comics and wanted to know if I would be interested in writing an article to be published by PBS. Of course, I took her up on the opportunity, and, when published, I immediately began receiving positive comments from people around the world. I took my family out to dinner to celebrate, and I cried tears of joy. This was a major turning point in my life as I found that my voice had value beyond my classroom and that what I was doing made an impact on people around the world. With this newfound encouragement, I decided to continue to share my ideas. I presented at my first comic book convention, even though I was absolutely terrified before getting on the stage. By the time it was over, I had people lined up to talk to me, to ask me questions, and to say thank you for what I was doing. My world opened up as I began to find my people. Again, I implore YOU to share your educational passion with the world and to inspire others while also gathering a support system of educators.

Additionally, I shared my article with my students, and they were so supportive in my efforts and even left amazing comments on my PBS article. I knew then, as I do now, that this journey was not solely my journey but all of ours. My students were able to see the value of an authentic audience, of following your passions, and of pushing beyond our comfort zones. So many students have told me that they admire the way I integrate my passions into the classroom and that it helps them to validate their own endeavors. Currently, we are experiencing teacher shortages across the country, fewer enrolled education majors in universities, and new teachers who leave the profession in the first few years. We need to inspire the next generation of teachers and those currently in the profession—and we do this by igniting our own passions and integrating our strengths. I have presented to education majors, and many often remark how great it is to hear that education is not all standardized tests and that creativity still has a place in the classroom. Administrators, please keep this in mind when planning your district’s professional development days—encourage teachers to find ways to integrate their own personal passions into the classroom. Encourage them to share their journey with the world, to blog, to engage in Twitter chats, to create YouTube videos. We need to hear the voices of teachers and what is happening in their classrooms. As educators, we need to change and even drive the conversation.

Whenever I complete my presentations or workshops, I always have people come up to share with me how comics have had an impact in their lives. Many adults will tell me stories of how they learned to read through comics and are excited that they are now being used in classrooms. Many of us have that story of when a teacher took comics away from students—why? When we want students to read, why take away this obviously engaging medium? autistic adults, dyslexia, ADHD, and more have come to shake my hand to also tell me how comics enabled them to learn to read. Educators come and say thank you for giving them the permission they needed to bring their passion for comics into the classroom, that they were too hesitant to do so. One of my all-time favorite moments was when, following a guest lecture at Gwynedd Mercy University, a student came up to me and asked for my autograph. She had taken copious notes as I spoke and wanted me to sign them! It is these experiences that keep me going and have me traveling the country. I even befriended the PA Secretary of Education, Pedro Rivera, through social media, and he came to visit my classroom on the first day of school one year. Turns out that he also loves comics and understands the power they can bring to education. More than that, he always spoke about how teachers need to look for inspiration in each other. Teaching can often make educators feel as though they are on an island, but this can be dissipated when we share our successes, and failures, with one another.