Reading By The Fire

Curled up by the fireplace with a good book: Captain Underpants

This is our holiday greeting card for 2013

Tonight was one of those moments when you say to yourself "Ahhhh! Finally all the reading together is paying off!"  Our son has been an advanced reader, however the real zest for reading seemed to have gone into hibernation...until now. Typically, I will put a book in his workbox twice a week to be read aloud to me, and he dutifully reads it to me, but when given the choice of activities to do in his "spare" time, he does not often pick up a book. In fact, he hasn't picked up a book without prompting since he was about four years old (he was three years old when he started devouring simple readers, letting us know that he had taught himself to read).

Today, I picked up a box of hand-me-down books from my dear friend Kelly, who lives an hour-and-a-half away from me over in New Hampshire. In the box was a book that *I* didn't actually have much interest in - Captain Underpants. The book has 34 (short-ish) chapters and is a sizeable book that is probably geared more towards the 4th-5th grade crowd. Our son is 6.

Even while in the car after picking up this box of books, he dug the Captain Underpants book out of the box and began to read. In the car. When I stopped at the pharmacy, instead of getting out to see what treats he could get from the store, he asked to remain in the car so he could read his book! When all of our errands were done and we returned home, he snuggled into our chair next to the fireplace and read for another half hour or more.  I was pleasantly surprised and delighted!!!

I had not been pushing reading, because as I have been studying Waldorf Education principles, I have discovered that reading is not truly a goal until about grade 2...and even then it would be common to stick to simple readers, allowing the students to progress at their own pace. Well, I can honestly say I have been trying to stay true to that goal! I have only been having our son read aloud to us maybe twice a week, focusing instead on reading *to* him, telling him stories using props and puppets, and listening to audio stories online. I wanted to slow the pace down a bit so we could try to get more in line with what would be taught in a Waldorf school in grade 1.

I guess the saying is true that you cannot truly un-hear, un-see, or un-learn something. Since my son was not showing a great deal of interest in picking out books to read on his own, I was backing off quite a bit on having him read on his own (except for short readers twice a week for about 10 minutes each). It would seem that he has finally found something to read that interests him enough to choose it on his own for a free-time activity. It really gives me hope that he can develop a love of reading. My husband, myself, and my sixteen year old are all very avid readers, and I am quietly excited that our son may be following suit.

Am I allowed to call this a parenting/homeschooling win?