I love books, I love reading, I love words. Part of the reason I became a teacher was to share my love of reading with my students. As a teacher, I worked hard to make my classroom a literacy rich environment. I made books, magazines, even comic books easily accessible to my students, posted label word cards on items in the classroom (when I taught younger grades). I read aloud to my class each day and also gave my students time to personal read, and I discussed the importance of reading and using reading strategies with my students. I also tried to share my passion for reading! Reading opens up a new world to a child. Not only can knowledge be easily accessed through reading, but reading also expands a child's imagination, problem-solving abilities, introduces them to new situations and experiences, and increases their confidence as they learn to read, learn new words and learn new reading strategies. Children decide to be authors after reading a great book, or poets, or artists. They are inspired to be better people after reading biographies, or want to try a new recipe or start a club after reading a book that inspires them. I could go on and on and share stories of students I've worked with whose entire lives changed as they learned to read or were impacted by books read to them.
Now that I am home and not teaching in a public setting, my home is now my classroom and my children are my now pupils. I still feel just as strongly about the importance of creating a literacy rich environment in my new classroom setting so we read every day, no matter how busy or tired we are. We sing songs with books, talk a lot about what's going on in our environment, and look for daily opportunities to build vocabulary. It's not really that much of an effort because Naomi is such a sponge at this age, and its so worth it. And when I see my darling toddler loving story time my momma/teacher heart just jumps! I get so excited for the journeys she will take, the lessons she will learn, the problems she will solve, the characters she will love and hate, and "oh the places she will go" through a great book, or magazine article, comic book, or even newspaper story. I get excited for the doors that will open for her just because she can read and realizes the importance of reading.
When I look at her I remember being a young girl, staying up late nights with my mom who also shares a love of reading. We'd each be sitting on a different couch, next to a lamp, turning our pages eagerly. One particular school night, I was up way past my bedtime because I couldn't put my book down. Mom had a book out, too, that she was equally enthralled with. Finally she said, "Trice, we need to get to bed. It's late." I begged for one more chapter and she confessed she wanted to read one more, too. 3 chapters later we finally went to bed. Tired and happy for our love of reading. I can't wait to share some similar moments with my little ones!
No comments:
Post a Comment