This week is Read Across America week. In honor of that, I hope to write multiple posts supporting and promoting reading.
As a young child, I was an avid reader. I was reading on my own before kindergarten. I remember in first grade receiving our reading textbook. The teacher assigned a few stories as homework. I came back the next day and told her I had read the entire book. At first, she didn't believe me. She asked me questions about random stories and I answered them. Fortunately, she went next door and asked the second grade teacher for her reading textbook and pushed me ahead. I am forever grateful for that. I read voraciously.
My mother, my grandmother and great-aunt all supported this habit. For birthdays and Christmas gifts I would receive books. As a young child, I had the little red record player with a case. All the books came with a small record and the bell would ding when it was time to turn the page. I would sit for hours in my room listening to the different fairy tales and Disney stories as I read along with the books.
My mom enrolled me in a Weekly Reader (anyone remember those?) books of the month club. Each month I would receive a package with 4-5 books in it. I devoured classics like titles by Louisa May Alcott and Jesse Stuart. I remember loving Black Beauty, Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm, The Secret Garden, The Little Princess and Heidi. I devoured the entire set of Little House on the Prairie Books by Laura Ingalls Wilder. Then it was all the Beverly Cleary titles - Ramona, Dear Mr. Henshaw, Ramona and Beezus and more. I read Judy Blume, Choose Your Own Adventure titles and The Babysitter's Club.
One of my most favorite series of books was Anne of Green Gables. Once I read through the entire series, I was in love with Anne, the red-headed girl and her bosom friend, Diana. I could just picture Gilbert and the Cuthberts. P.E. Island was an enchanting place in my mind. I read through that series many times as a child and young adult. In sixth grade, I read it again as part of my class and we watched the movies. Megan Follows was the
perfect Anne!
I remember my fourth grade teacher, Mrs. Kuster, doing a contest to encourage reading. For every book we read, we added an ice cream scoop to our cone. I remember reading every spare minute to add as many scoops as I could. In fifth grade, Mr. Hopkins was my teacher. He did a whole focus on Newbery Award books. I read Anpao, Island of the Blue Dolphin, Julie of the Wolves, Bridge to Terabithia, My Brother Sam is Dead, and Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH.
In high school, I had Mrs.Price for English I and II. We read novels, short stories, essays, poetry and wrote a great deal of our own. She read with emphasis and voice and inflection. She opened our eyes to so many ideas and encouraged us to truly dig deep and think for ourselves. I devoured Jane Austen's
Pride and Prejudice (still a favorite), Harper Lee's
To Kill a Mockingbird, Tess of the D'Urbervilles, The Fountainhead, Cat's Cradle, The Great Gatsby, Of Mice and Men, The Grapes of Wrath, Fahrenheit 451, The Red Badge of Courage, and A Separate Peace. We read Shakespeare, Browning, Dunne, Keats, Tennyson and more. We argued, dissected, and debated opinions. We wrote poetry, read our short stories and she read us her own writing.
In college, I had two English Literature courses as well as several History courses. We read books I liked and some I hated. One of my favorite courses was Recent America, taught by Dr. Apple. We read Going After Cacciato (Vietnam), The Feminie Mystique (Feminisim), books about World War II and the Korean conflict. We used literature to examine America's history since the 1940s.
Through my entire life, I have enjoyed reading as an escape. I love immersing myself in the setting of the book, feeling the emotion of the characters, exploring new ideas and understanding past events. I love reading God's word and knowing it is alive and applicable today as it was thousands of years ago.
Books are powerful.
Books are life-changing.
Reading transforms lives.
I am so thankful so many in my life pointed me to books. It truly has shaped and molded who I am today. If you can read - thank your teachers, parents and librarians. Pass a love of reading onto your children!
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