Growing up in a family of teachers, you would think I was the brightest crayon in the whole box. This was true, especially when it came to reading and writing. My mom, a first grade teacher, wouldn’t expect anything but the best from me and my sister, and that is exactly what she got.
As a toddler, I enjoyed many of the books and lesson plans my mother would bring home from her classroom. Most of them were very simple and typical books for a first grader to read. My preschool teachers always found it very awkward that I was only about 3 years old and reading better than most kindergarteners. I could read the words on the page, but I didn’t quite comprehend what I was doing until about kindergarten. I knew how to read, but I didn’t know it would change my whole life, and open up a whole new world of opportunities for me.
Before I even started speaking my mother would always sing songs and read books to me right before bedtime. Every night my mother would bring home simple activities for me and my sister to do, such as sight words, A B C cards, number cards, and tons more. So by the time I started kindergarten, I was fully identifying and reading first grade sight words.
When I surpassed first grade, I was very eager to learn as many new things ahead of my grade as possible. When I reached second grade, my aunt became a 3rd grade reading teacher. She would help me learn some of the new things she taught her students throughout the week, and even bring a few books from her class room for me to read. I found these books very pleasing, and soon after started reading many book in the Junie B. Jones series, most of which came from my aunt’s class room or my public library. But little did I know, I wasn’t fully soaking in these books until I started reading for fun.
Being in school, we were almost forced to do this AR, accelerated reading, program. The program was read a book, take the computerized test over the book, get the points, go to an AR party and move on with the rest of your life. While racking up point in the hundreds, no one really knew what it was like to read a book and fall in love with the book and want to read it over and over again.
The only real reason we actually read was because we wanted to go to the stupid parties. Now that we have gotten older, I don’t see as many students with their heads buried in books. If they are not benefiting from the read, they aren’t reading at all. At one point in time, we all enjoyed reading. It may have been from a magazine, sports books, newspaper or just a piece of paper with words, reading has benefited us all in today’s world. If we didn’t have reading it would be almost impossible for us to accomplish any tasks in life.
As a toddler, I enjoyed many of the books and lesson plans my mother would bring home from her classroom. Most of them were very simple and typical books for a first grader to read. My preschool teachers always found it very awkward that I was only about 3 years old and reading better than most kindergarteners. I could read the words on the page, but I didn’t quite comprehend what I was doing until about kindergarten. I knew how to read, but I didn’t know it would change my whole life, and open up a whole new world of opportunities for me.
Before I even started speaking my mother would always sing songs and read books to me right before bedtime. Every night my mother would bring home simple activities for me and my sister to do, such as sight words, A B C cards, number cards, and tons more. So by the time I started kindergarten, I was fully identifying and reading first grade sight words.
When I surpassed first grade, I was very eager to learn as many new things ahead of my grade as possible. When I reached second grade, my aunt became a 3rd grade reading teacher. She would help me learn some of the new things she taught her students throughout the week, and even bring a few books from her class room for me to read. I found these books very pleasing, and soon after started reading many book in the Junie B. Jones series, most of which came from my aunt’s class room or my public library. But little did I know, I wasn’t fully soaking in these books until I started reading for fun.
Being in school, we were almost forced to do this AR, accelerated reading, program. The program was read a book, take the computerized test over the book, get the points, go to an AR party and move on with the rest of your life. While racking up point in the hundreds, no one really knew what it was like to read a book and fall in love with the book and want to read it over and over again.
The only real reason we actually read was because we wanted to go to the stupid parties. Now that we have gotten older, I don’t see as many students with their heads buried in books. If they are not benefiting from the read, they aren’t reading at all. At one point in time, we all enjoyed reading. It may have been from a magazine, sports books, newspaper or just a piece of paper with words, reading has benefited us all in today’s world. If we didn’t have reading it would be almost impossible for us to accomplish any tasks in life.
