The day you learned to read

[Leyland]

Do any of you remember when you learned to read? I was in first grade in the days of the 'house' books and distinctly remember a certain point when the letters not only formed words, but the words formed sentences telling me things were happening! Well, Spot was running and Dick was watching Spot run and Jane was doing something or the other, but something huge and momentous clicked for me right then. I got to be somewhere else and I liked it.

I raced through the red house book and the blue house book and so on, while my fellow first graders were not quite so enthusiastic about their new skills. My class was a split, or overflow, comprised of first and second grades in the same classroom, so my teacher let me read all the second grade books as well. A new world was discovered that year and I've never looked back!

[Divia]

I struggled with reading when I was going to school. I started to get better in middle school, but still struggled. I could never read aloud even to this day which makes being an elementary librarian (ick) very difficult. I also still have trouble reading. I screw up my letters and my mind sees words that arent there.

[SonjaMarie]

Mom claims I was reading at 3, of course I don't know if that's true or not, but it just seems I've always been reading. When I was in 3rd (or 4th) grade my teacher singled me out in front of my class to say that I had one of the highest scores on the CAT test for the reading section, that I was reading at 12th grade level. I was very embarassed, I've always hated being in front of a group of people and being the center of attention, still do!

SM

[MLE]

believe it or not, I learned to read late. For one thing, my Mom and older siblings read aloud to me, a LOT. My parents were both what would now be termed ADHD, and what that meant functionally (though they weren't doing it purposely, it was just a way they had figured to survive without being overstimulated) was that we had no TV and no radio programs allowed except classical music (no vocals, unless in strange languages).

We too, got the Dick and Jane books, but we were taught using the 'see, say' method and I sat in the back with my 20/400 vision. I had no clue. My IQ was measured at 88, just slightly higher than Forrest Gump, so nobody thought my not being able to read needed any remedial work. At home, where it might have been noticed, we had first one, and then another of my younger brothers dying of leukemia, a long-drawn out business, so my parents can be excused if they were a little busy. The sibs kept reading to me.
Somewhere around third grade somebody handed me a mystery, and something just 'clicked'. I discovered the school library, a wonderful summer librarian gave me all the Newbery books and stopped to talk about each one as I finished it, and from that point on I have never had my nose out of a book!

Just think, Divia, you are in aposition to be that librarian to some snotty-nosed little kid. They'll thank you the rest of their lives.

[Alaric]

I learned just before I went to school, so I was four-going-on-five then. My nanna used to read to me and then showed me how to read the words and make sense of them. I learned the sort of thing they teach in your first year - reading, writing, simple maths, time, currency, etc - very quickly too.

I used to read a fair bit when I was that age until I was in year 3 (4th year in the UK I think - I was eight) when I had the most awful teacher who made us read the truly most damnable pieces of trash. She was an awful teacher and an equally awful woman who used to quite angrily have a go at us if we didn't read the rubbish she tried to force down our throats, which I basically never did. It really turned me off reading for fun in my own time for years. That wasn't helped by another horrible teacher I had in year 10 who made us read Wuthering Heights. I didn't even bother and just read the cliff-notes.

I only really started reading for fun in my own time again in my later teens, from about seventeen onwards. That first teacher really did a lot of damage and if I saw her again I'd bloody well tell the bitch that. I'm not the only one who hated her and the stuff she forced down our throats.

[pat]

I dont recall having the 'lightglobe moment' when reading. There was so much else going on in my life when I was that age: I was in and out of hospital from the age of three till six or seven. Mum and aunts always read to me, and my big brother let me have a look at his books! I do know mum brought me Twinkle comic to read in hospital!

[diamondlil]

I don't remember a specific day when I could read. I do remember being VERY proud of myself in grade 1 or 2 because I read a really huge book. It ended up being not such a big book (Wind in the Willows), so it must have had very big print.

[Alaric]

Wind in the Willows is still over 300 pages, so that's a great effort at that age!

[Grasshopper]

I was an early reader. I don't remember when it was that I learned.

I could read and spell and write in cursive and do some math all before kindergarten (I remember being the only one in class to read the word "pronunciation" in 1st grade), but I had trouble tying my shoes. LOL!

[EC2]

I remember we were given a first reader when I was five years old. I picked up reading very quickly (unlike maths. We don't talk about that!). I remember that there was the story of Little Red Riding Hood later in the book with an illustration I particularly liked. I was determined to read that story, and being as learning to read came easily, I had an incentive to push on by myself and find out. To me reading wasn't homework or hard work. It was fun. I couldn't read before I went to school but I was read to a great deal.

[Ash]

I am loving these stories!

There were always books in my house (my dad loved to read, tho my mom thought it a waste of time), and I remember being very young watching my sister reading for school. I don't remember being read to, tho I always looked at picture books, until I discovered the library. My parents owned a deli, and on the weekends to keep me out from underfoot, they sent me off across the street to the main library (I was about 5, in the early 60s when folks didn't worry about kids alone). The children's librarian e took me under her wing (I suspect dad gave her a deal; free pastrami sandwiches for watching the kid!) She always had time to read to me, and sometime in that year I was reading by myself. Over the years, she continued to be my reading mentor, encouraging me to read different books, and books above my level, and always talking with me about them. By the time I was in 3rd grade I was in the highest level reading group and was hooked on reading.

Reading was my escape from school and family; I read as much as my mom would let me at home, or as much as I could on my free time. When I was in HS saw the librarian at our branch library, she'd retired but was working there as a volunteer. That was so much fun to see her (and as an adult now, I suspect it was quite a high for her as well).

Many many years later when I discovered the net, I told this same story in a similar thread. A poster said that the librarian was her godmother, and was able to take a letter from me to her. By that time she was quite old, and didn't remember me clearly, but loved the letter. I think of her every time I get similar letters from former students and from parents, and hope that I am as much of an inspriation to them as she was to me.

[Leyland]

I read a lot after school but mostly in the evening from second grade on, because I was running around the neighborhood chasing after my older brother with the boy next door right after school. We climbed trees, went box sledding down the CA hillsides and played with Matchbox cars and GI Joes. I was a tomboy bookworm, I suppose.

My parents took us on weekend roadtrips all the time even we were little, and I always took at least two books to read in the car. We'd be in some cool place and I'd be sitting on a bench, nose deep in book and worlds away, while waiting for family but then get left behind because I'd forget the watch where they went.

Kinda like those movies, Home Alone. My mother, "Where's Elizabeth!?" and send my brother back to find me. Sometimes she'd take my book away to keep me focused.

[Kailana]

I don't know when I learned to read, I just sort of always have! Even when I wasn't sure what it was that I was doing I had a book in my hands... Actually, my first word was 'book'. A fact that my parents remind me of from time to time. I guess I had my priorities straight... Ahem... I was reading before I started school, I know that much. Neither of my parents are big readers, so while I was read to, they never really paid attention to when I started actually reading the words and not just memorizing stories that they had told me before. I read at a higher level all through school, which was really annoying, actually. We would have to read books independently and my friends would come in with typical books for their age and my teachers would make me get another one! So, I went through V.C. Andrews in elementary school... This also meant that I pretty much skipped young adult fiction when I was a young adult.

[Vanessa]

I remember learning to read with 'Janet and John' books. I think I was quite average - my report for when I was 7 said 'Vanessa is now a fluent reader'. I've always loved to read. Charlotte's Web was a book which I read over and over again until it fell apart - my mum had to go out and buy me a new copy as I was so distressed! LOL. (I'm rubbish at Maths, though!!)

[Leyland]

(I'm rubbish at Maths, though!!)

I noticed EC brought up maths as well (not to talk about it :)). I'm like Vanessa and rubbish at it, though not for lack of trying - algebra and trig remain great mysteries of the universe for me. My SAT college entrance exam score was fairly high on the verbal side and shamefully low on the maths side. :o

As an accountant, I can add, subtract, divide, and calculate the ratio of a change between two amounts. Excel spreadsheet formulas do so much of the work for me. :rolleyes:

[Misfit]

I don't remember a specific moment either, but I do know that because of my birthday (December) they told mom that I had to wait another year to start kindergarten (sp?). She told them I wanted to read and if they wouldn't let me in she'd teach me. They didn't like that but wouldn't let me start and mom told them to pound sand. Guess who was reading third grade readers in the first grade?

My favorite series was the Oz books (yes folks, there's a whole series of them). I had mom's copies from the 30's (and yes I still have those aging beauties) and loved reading them again and again. Gorgeous drawings and artwork as well.

[Ash]

I noticed EC brought up maths as well (not to talk about it :)). I'm like Vanessa and rubbish at it, though not for lack of trying - algebra and trig remain great mysteries of the universe for me. My SAT college entrance exam score was fairly high on the verbal side and shamefully low on the maths side. As an accountant, I can add, subtract, divide, and calculate the ratio of a change between two amounts. Excel spreadsheet formulas do so much of the work for me. :rolleyes:

I do know people who are good at math and verbal skills, equally, but it seems many are better at one than the other. My brother, who always struggled with reading, got my mother's math genes it seems. Both were brillant with it, and I always wished it would all come to me as easily. I can do basic math calculations tho prefer to use a calculator just because I'm afraid of making mistakes. And I prefer my husband to do much of the check book math as he does it with much more ease and less frustration than I do. Yet I can read and write circles around them all.

[Ash]

I don't remember a specific moment either, but I do know that because of my birthday (December) they told mom that I had to wait another year to start kindergarten (sp?). She told them I wanted to read and if they wouldn't let me in she'd teach me. They didn't like that but wouldn't let me start and mom told them to pound sand. Guess who was reading third grade readers in the first grade? .

Misfit, they told my parents the same, so they paid money to put me in a private school that didn't have such rules. I excelled academically, unfortunately I didn't socially, I was always the youngest in school, and have wondered what would have happened if my parents had waited....Our state now has a September 1 rule for kindergarten entry, with an Early K option for children who are five between Sept 1 and Dec 31.

I don't remember the moment I first read, but I have seen the moment when some of my students do. I usually have one or two in my class that are on their way by the last semester before Kindergarten. I've seen their surprise when they realize what those symbols mean when they go together. Then there is no stopping them and they want to know what every word is that they see. I love it!

[Kailana]

I don't remember a specific moment either, but I do know that because of my birthday (December) they told mom that I had to wait another year to start kindergarten (sp?). She told them I wanted to read and if they wouldn't let me in she'd teach me. They didn't like that but wouldn't let me start and mom told them to pound sand. Guess who was reading third grade readers in the first grade?

My favorite series was the Oz books (yes folks, there's a whole series of them). I had mom's copies from the 30's (and yes I still have those aging beauties) and loved reading them again and again. Gorgeous drawings and artwork as well.

I started school late too because my birthday is in October. So, I feel your pain. That's probably why I read so young because I learned at home and not at school!

[Alaric]

That almost happened to me too.

In Australia (we moved back here just before I started school) the school year runs by the calendar, so it starts end of January and goes to the start of December. The cut-off for admission is July 1 and I was born on June 30, if I had been born 3 1/2 hours later I would have had to wait until the next year to start school.

[pat]

Because of the hospital thing I started school earlier than my peers so I didnt miss out too much. I went into the reception class twice! It worked as I was able to keep up in my proper reception year.

[ellenjane]

I don't remember not being able to read. I'm not sure quite when I learned, but my mom says somewhere around 3 or 4. It was apparently a collaborative teaching effort between my mom and Sesame Street, helped along by the fact that I really, really wanted to learn.

It did cause me a bit of trouble when I started school. In first grade, I was reading Nancy Drew and books like that, but the elementary school library was divided by grade level. I wasn't allowed to check out the books I wanted to read until my mom called up the principal.

[Ludmilla]

I started reading beginner reader books in first grade (and I was the youngest person in my class, being one of those September kids near the cutoff, so I was 5/6 that school year).

My reading was fairly sporadic in elementary school, and living in a small town, the selection I had to choose from was very modest compared to today's standards. I read chapters books (mostly 100 pages or less) in 3rd/4th grade, but a lot of the books that I see parents brag about their kids reading as 1st or 2nd graders (such as "A Wrinkle in Time", "The Hobbit", etc.), I didn't read until 5th or 6th grade, which was considered fairly normal back in my day. I guess I feel prickly about this subject, because my kids are still young and they're learning to read around the same time I did, but if you go to any parenting site, you're made to feel like your kid is behind if he/she isn't reading Harry Potter by 2nd or 3rd grade. I know some kids learn young (by 3 or 4 let's say), but the normal (average) age that kids begin to read is really a year or two older than that.

[donroc]

Difficult to say the exact day. I could read 1st grade books by the age of 4 thanks to my parents.

[Ash]

I guess I feel prickly about this subject, because my kids are still young and they're learning to read around the same time I did, but if you go to any parenting site, you're made to feel like your kid is behind if he/she isn't reading Harry Potter by 2nd or 3rd grade. I know some kids learn young (by 3 or 4 let's say), but the normal (average) age that kids begin to read is really a year or two older than that.

Well, I'm not surprised - our curriculum has been pushed down so far that Kindergartners are now expected to do 2nd grade work. Because kids generally learn to read at 6 or 7 (all of us early ones are the exceptions I think) kids who can't read in kindergarten are left behind, made to feel like failures, and just lead to more of an educational devide. And I also don't believe some of these parents who say there kid is reading Harry Potter that early; maybe the kid can 'read' it, but are they understanding the book? I know it wouldn't have been a book I would have been interested in at that age, much less comprehended.

[sweetpotatoboy]

...mom told them to pound sand

I hadn't heard that expression before! I guessed the meaning but had to look it up to be sure....

[sweetpotatoboy]

I don't remember not being able to read either. I think I was partly taught at home pre-school as I have a vague memory of at least knowing the alphabet when we were taught it. I do recall my father teaching me to read Hebrew, but not English, though I'm pretty sure he did...

Anyway, I know I read early (and late into the night, which frequently got me into trouble, but I'm sure that's not unusual here).

[Vanessa]

Oh, I remember trying to read under the bedclothes with a torch!!!:D My daughter just switches her light on. LOL.

[Ash]

do recall my father teaching me to read Hebrew, but not English, though I'm pretty sure he did....

I went to a kindergarten sponsored by our synagogue, and vividly remember the teacher teaching us the Hebrew alphabet. I must have learned the English (I was close to reading by that time anyway) but I don't remember it as well as the other.

[Misfit]

I hadn't heard that expression before! I guessed the meaning but had to look it up to be sure....


OK, now you have to tell us how you Brits would have said the same thing. :p:)

[sweetpotatoboy]

OK, now you have to tell us how you Brits would have said the same thing. :p:)

Hmm, I guess we'd say telling someone to go jump in a lake (or off a cliff). (or stick it where the sun don't shine) depending on the exact context...

[Maggie]

I hated reading when I was a child. I remember struggling through the Peter and Jane books. I remember feeling that books were boring for me back then. It wasn't until about 8 years ago that I really got into reading and now I wish I had been a book reader many many years ago.

[Ash]

You probably made up for lost time! Interesting story that John Steinbeck told about his own reading beginning. He also disliked reading. It wasn't until he was 11, when an aunt gave him Morte de Arthur, that something clicked. After that he read everything he could get his hands on, and of course later became a writer himself. So its never too late.