On teaching a child to read...

Have you ever taught a child to read? Have you watched her eyes work hard at the code in front of her? Have you seen the frustration and the elation? Her brow furrowed in concentration. Her lips puckered trying to sound it out.

I think reading is something that we take for granted. I doubt any of us remember learning to read. You may have a memory of sitting down with mom and reading a book to her. But do you remember learning to decipher the code? It's just something most of us know and once you know it you move on as if you had been born reading. But it's hard to learn, hard to teach. It's like you're an archeologist that's just uncovered a whole set of ancient books. Only you don't know what it says because to you it's just a bunch of symbols. Isn't that what it's like for a child? Just a bunch of symbols and sounds that we expect them to piece together into words. And then just to keep everyone confused, we throw in extra sounds to go with some of the symbols. I don't think any thing else they learn in these early school years is as difficult as reading.

It's hard to watch them struggle. It's hard to see my child so frustrated. I hurt for her when she gets tired of it and we have to push through to finish the homework. My children's school principal likes to say that "reading is truly magic". I wish it was magic. I wish I could just blow a sort of fairy dust and poof she can read. It takes work though. For both of us, but mostly for her. She tries so hard. And oh, when she gets it, my heart melts. When she reads a whole sentence without stumbling I'm so very proud. Her smile in that moment makes all of the frustrating moments worth it. Maybe I've just heard that phrase a few hundred time too many over the last few years, but reading kind of is magic. It's a sort of treasure in itself. Knowing how to read is a gift that maybe we shouldn't take for granted.