We Read

I wrote this blog entry in 2018, but I have decided to bump it to the top of my feed because it is so very applicable during the current school closures. Enjoy.

I set out to teach my children something every day. We read something. We craft things. We play with numbers. And with all that stuff that we do, we still have to learn the basic stuff like washing our hands before we eat a meal, and remembering to use the toilet. This basic stuff gets very hard. But...  It is not always difficult. It is often relaxing. I can't even believe that I am saying that, but it is true.  And you know what? One of the most unexpectedly relaxing things we do together is reading.  

We read. Oh, we read. I read aloud to them a lot. So, we started into the Narnia series and my 5 year old is hooked. She sits there, staring over my shoulder at the words. As I read dramatically she pipes in with gasps of shock or sound effects which add to the experience. She pauses to explain things to her sister. She talks about the story later, and agonizes over what will happen next (Will Lucy ever see Tumnus again? When will they all go to Narnia?). She looks forward to our reading time as much as I looked forward to it with my own mother. And it’s an odd thing, feeling my face duplicating the expressions that my mother made as we read. We read together for years - book after book, story after story, one adventure after the next. The Wizard of Oz, Through the Looking Glass, 2000 Leagues Under the Sea. Oh, how we (past tense) read. And now I get to do this with my children, and it is even more delightful than I expected. 

And you know what, this reading aloud is paying off. Today my 5 year old raced quickly through our reading activity. Now, if you haven't seen these yet, they're pretty neat. I broke down words into sounds - I introduce one or two sounds each day. I show her some words with the sounds and she fills in the letters - and I write brief stories for her to read using just those sounds along with a few simple 2-and 3 letter words.

Here's a video of her reading. She got to do tricks every time she sounded out a word.

 As she reads for herself each word and then each line, she smiles with excitement, and realizes that she can read. Perhaps not as dramatically as she would like, but she is making progress, and she sees it. She feels those words and can't wait to read even more. 

Every day is fun with the children. Even as we're learning to read.