Did you know that March is National Reading Month!
March was chosen to honor Dr. Seuss's birthday.
When I was a child, I fell in love with reading and libraries. There were so many to choose from in my city's grand public library. It was a magnificent structure in downtown Syracuse, NY that opened my eyes to magical wonders. The stacks in the children's library were filled with books about faraway places and times. I spent hours mulling over the precious publications and always walked away with a new stack of books.
But that library was not the only one that amazed me. Each summer when I visited my Nonnie in Rome, NY, we would spend time walking to the library. My love for reading increased with age. It's not surprising that booklove was one of the reasons why I studied to become a reading specialist.
My first classroom had a small area for books nestled in the corner of the cafeteria. My high school students were not readers but I had an intense desire to introduce them to the pleasures of reading. From there, I was asked to start a reading program for 7th graders in another impoverished setting. My love for books continued to grow as did the libraries I shared with K-12th grade students. To entice the elementary students to read, I offered schoolwide read alouds during holiday times. The teachers and I celebrated Dr. Seuss' birthday on March 2nd wearing Cat in the Hat hats and reading to students. Then, after 25 years in classrooms as a reading specialist, I moved to central administration as a districtwide director of language arts. In that capacity, I was able to open libraries for classroom teachers in each of the 5 elementary schools. Now, I enjoy reading to my grandgirls with books I have collected over the years.
Michelle Kogan, Molly Hogan, Marcie Flinchum Atkins, Margaret Simon (sticker)
