4Th Grade, 9Yo. Is That Too Young for the Hunger Games?

No. Just because kids are capable of reading books at a certain reading level does not mean it is appropriate subject matter for them. Many books intended for older audiences (teens, adults) are technically written at a 5th grade reading level. This does not mean 5th graders should be reading them.

I would NOT let my kids read that at that age if the trilogy had been around when mine were that young. No way on this earth...

I say, until you are ready for her to read it. Our daughter was interested in 5th grade. She, too, is a voracious reader. We decided the content was not appropriate for her at that age and steered her to choose something else.

She read the first one over this past summer (she's 12 now, and in 7th grade). I think it is much more appropriate at this age.

I have not read the books or seen the movie, but I am aware of what they contain, generally speaking. I see it differently than Anne Frank, and differently than some super hero movie as well. It is very different for death to be presented as evil than for it to be presented as part of entertainment.

I would actually be interested in statistics on which parents (at what ages) allowed their children to read these/see the movie and how it compares to which households watch reality TV. It's pretty much the same thing, but upping the ante. Putting people's lives on display as entertainment.

I don't like it. And since my daughter is old enough to understand the nuances of that exploitation, we can have a meaningful conversation about it.
Many people think Golding's Lord of the Flies is terrible for kids to read, because it depicts kids killing each other. But I will say this: At least they weren't doing it simply for entertainment. And it's a neat little study on human behavior when there is no outside authority present, how every society will develop an authority, whether benevolent or not. In the Hunger Games, that authority is what authorizes the grotesque human behavior. Or so I understand.

If you want her to wait, by all means... make her wait. She's your kid.

For age perspective, I will relate a brief comment of my husband's. We have 2 kids, mind you. An older son (who is 15 now) and our daughter who turned 12 over the summer. Husband commented in the spring to the effect that: "I love this age. She is so much fun, and yet still has the innocence. It'll be gone soon and I wish this age she is at could last a little longer."
And it is true. So, while you are musing on how much longer you can hope to keep her innocent, there's a timeline to plug into your equation. Depending upon what you allow her to be exposed to, and what she is exposed to via her friends, maybe around age 12, the innocence starts to fade and they become much more mature in their awareness of the world around them.

Don't rush her through. Enjoy it while it lasts. You/she can never get it back once it's gone.

I love the Hunger Games series and I would let a fourth grader read it. Our son chose to read it in 5th grade. He really enjoyed it.

I think the story is soooo much more than kids killing kids. It is about evil that rises and then good,honorable people who band together to triumph. It shows compassion,selflessness and integrity in its' purest form. It shows sacrificing one's own life to save another...what greater love can be shown?

I remember learning about slavery,Hitler,Stalin, American Indian massacres, African tribal wars etc. in school at a young age. I was not traumatized, it didn't take my innocence away. It helped mold my mind into understanding there is good and evil in the world. It helped me to love learning and to know there is a world out there that isn't as "innocent' and safe as in my hometown.

Kids today are seeing and hearing a lot these days because media is everywhere...even at their fingertips. Reading the Hunger Games caused us to have some great discussions with our son regarding humanity at its best and worst. Sure..we could have had those discussions without reading the book. But, the book brought it alive for him..and intrigued him. Learning took place..compassion was felt. He has a strong desire to fight for goodness and justice in the world. Maybe Katniss Everdeen had a hand in that.

I personally looked past the violence and saw such stronger themes that far overshadowed the violence. Our son was the same. I just didn't play up the violence when we talked about the book. We talked about the relationships between characters, the defiance against evil, the compassion showed between characters when survival of the fittest was the name of the game.

Oooh..just thinking about it makes me want to read them again. I remember it sparking a flame in me to always teach our kids to choose helping others and doing the right thing over one's survival.

My daughter read them in fourth grade before the movie came out (the movie came out a couple months before she turned 10).

What I did was read the first book with her, that way I could gauge how much it was affecting her in case we needed to stop. She read the second one on her own, then we read the third one together again (mainly because I thought some of the political stuff would be a little hard for her to understand). She has since read them two or three more times and LOVES the books and movie.

I think it depends on your kid's ability to handle stuff. Some of her friends were okay with the books, and some probably still haven't read them in 6th grade. My daughter had also read all the Harry Potter books, and we own all those movies.

Once she read the book the movie wasn't too much for her to see. I feel they did a good job with not showing too much gore with the killings, and she knew the big hit with Rue's death was coming, which I think the shock of that would have been tough without advance warning.

Edited to add that I agree you should read them yourself before deciding. They are very engrossing and you can get through them quickly. I loved the books myself.

When I first heard about the books and was horrified by the subject matter and terrified to read the books, I asked someone from our church who teaches middle school English. She teaches 6th, 7th and 8th grade, and she said she has her 7th graders read the book and discusses it in class, but she would not be comfortable allowing her 6th graders to read it.

At first I thought, are you serious! You WANT them to read the books? But she did explain to me the point of the entire trilogy, so I decided to give it a try. I did like the books, and I'm eager to watch the movies. But I'd also be hesitant to let my kids read them before they were 12. That sounds like an age in which they'd would be old enough to really discuss the book and the issues.

I agree with 12.

Our daughter would have been allowed to read these books at that age if she asked. Heck she read" the Diary of Anne Frank" in 4th grade. And learned about the Holocaust. That is real life, so the "Hunger games" is no big deal compared.. it is just fiction.

She has always been a mature child and understood fiction.

I would have probably read them with her so we could discuss them.

I read every book our child did until she was in 8th grade and then I just could not keep up with all of the books she read..

I have the Hunger book Games books on CD.. I listened to them one summer each time I was in the car. We would discuss them.

I think it very much depends on your views and on your child's maturity. My kids, now 9 and 12, have read the Harry Potter books, numerous myths and legends, and Tolkien, and watched and read every Star Wars thing they could get their hands on. All of these involve violence of some kind. Violence in a good vs. evil context or in war was something I thought they were ready to explore.

The Hunger Games trilogy (which I love and will allow my kids to read when the time is right) requires more maturity to understand, I think. I would now allow my 12 year old to read them. (Although the question hasn't come up, since she has recently stolen my Jane Austen and is now in love with Mr. Darcy...) I think she is ready to understand the dystopian themes, the satire of the reality TV culture, and the question of when one is justified in rebelling against authority. Plus she understands just enough about love, sex, and human relationships to grasp that part of the story, too. My son, at 9, is not ready, even though he has the ability to read on the required level.

This is one woman's opinion. Other moms have no doubt seen this differently.

My daughter's friends all read it in 4th grade. Because so many of her classmates were reading it, her class spent a month on dystopian literature (she was in a gifted and talented class where the students were all reading on a 9th grade or higher level), but the teacher did not specifically include the hunger games. I didn't want her to feel left out of the discussions with her friends, so I offered to read it with her. She wasn't interested. While she didn't read that particular book, they did address the ideas of dystopian literature and some of the themes were scary and mature. She handled it beautifully and it really expanded her understanding of literature. Had she wanted to read it, I would have done it with her to discuss what she was reading, but I wouldn't have censored her from reading it.

This year (6th grade) it is required reading for the whole grade. They spent the first month and a half of school studying it. She's 11. Now she regrets not reading it earlier because she loved it.

ETA: By the way, the parents were not given a choice or notice they were reading it, but the school did send a permission slip to watch the movie at the end of the unit and the teachers skipped the most violent scenes during the movie. My daughter had already watched it at a friends house, though, as had most of the kids.

My son is dying to read them. I told him 5th grade. He is also in 4th right now. To be honest, I am SO exctied to read it with him.

I have to say, I am second guessing the third one now becuase I never thought about Finnick beign "sold". My guess is that he migh just think he had to go on dates with people, but I am not sure. I guess if he is old enough to figure it out, maybe that means he is old enough to read it? I don't know. But that you for bringing that part up!

The first one I have no problem with though. I kept waitin g for the "oh no, here is the reason he can't read it" part, but was pleased that it never came. A hard topic, yes. But not inappropriate. Plus they will probably know the gist of it from friends by then!

I agree that it depends on the child, and I love that you read it yourself and made your own decision. That's really how it should be done, IMO. My 9yo is not ready for The Hunger Games and won't be for quite awhile probably, but my older son would probably have been fine with the trilogy at 11 or so. He read The Lord of the Flies at 12 and was fine, but I can't imagine that being fine for our youngest in a couple of years (he'll be 10 soon). It really depends so much on the child.

For the record, I teach AP English.

The book reviews say it was written for ages 13 and up. I highly suggest that you read the books first. You know your child best. There is a lot of depth to the books. It is much more than a reality show where kids fight to the death. If you do decide they are appropriate for her, I suggest that you read and discuss them with her. As a reading specialist, I have never been comfortable with the book being recommended for even 5th grade. I think a kid has to be very mature to really grasp the "meat" of the story and because of the violence and romantic undertones I don't feel comfortable recommending it to kids that age. I wouldn't stop a kid from reading it, but I would not recommend it myself.

Read it yourself and judge then. It's a good series (well the first two were, the last one was awful) though most of the themes will likely go over her head (economics, politics, race, the role of government, personal sacrifice/responsibility.) It's really better suited to tweens and young teens, that's the age when kids are really starting to notice social dogma and how it affects their lives.
And violence? Have you ever paid attention to the lyrics to Rock-a-bye-Baby? Fairy tales and nursery rhymes are full of violence. What you should be looking at is whether or not she can really comprehend and process what she is reading, and whether or not you think she's mature enough to handle it, and the only way to do that is to read it yourself first. You're her mom and you know her best!

Both my kids read them at 9 and in the 4th grade. Didn't warp them at all.

I would not have let my son read it at 9.
(It wasn't written till he was a few years older than 9.)
He could read it now if he wanted to but it's not his preferred genre.
In 6th grade his class read "The Red Pony" which I did not care for but he didn't think anything of it.
Your average fairy tale has plenty of violence (even the cleaned up politically correct versions) - kids read them and love them anyway.
Snow White - Queen wants her heart cut out and poisons her - in the original Grimm tale the Queen is punished by being forced to dance in red hot iron shoes till she falls down dead.
Hansel and Gretel - Kids are abandoned to starve in forest - a witch wants to eat them - they escape by shoving her into a hot oven and killing her.
It's ok to put off reading some subject matters till they are older.

I really think it depends on the child - you know her best.

I read anything and everything at 9 years old and my parents were never the wiser (they are not readers).

I applaud your oversight. That being said I probably would have let my sons read it at 9. They were quite mature at that age. And there are some powerful ideas in Hunger Games.

As long as it wouldn't unduly frighten her . . . this coming from a person who read Salem's Lot in elementary school and didn't sleep for weeks. :)

I totally agree with Geneva L.

A. :)

My older son read the book (and watched the movie) when he was 10 and in grade four. My younger son was seven when he watched the movie, but he hasn't read the book yet.