I was in the midst of a completely different kind of blog post when I encountered something that prompted me to put THIS post together! This post is not about my coolest new freebie or a hot new packet you must get your hands on. This post is from my heart…or over-rated as it might be, this post is about something that is near and dear to me….reading!
I find it perfect timing as we prepare for our the upcoming year…that we take a minute to understand what our job is as educators..and just as importantly take time to appreciate the difference we DO make! First off…I want to talk about our job as educators. No, am not going to talk about how you should run your classroom or how many minutes you should spend teaching math everyday. Moreover, I want to talk about our job to teach children the love of reading!
It never fails that I hear my little Kindergarteners say, “But, Mrs. West I don’t know how to read!” Well, when I hear that the first thing I want to do is shed a little tear…but I quickly snap out of it and respond with a, “Of course you know how to read Johnny”…and I give them a quick example of they can read. Johnny might not be reading on a first grade level or know all of the 40 sight words, but Johnny can none the less read!
So, one of my first jobs as an educator is to teach my young learners what it means to read! After they realize that yes they CAN read they will be so inspired! We will read repetitious poems and songs, meet at the carpet to read easy readers as a group, or meet back at the table work on our one to one tracking skills saying animal picture names.
When you look at the definition above of reading you will notice the usual…letters and words, but look “symbols” is listed and even more “etc.” Don’t worry Johnny an “etc.” can be pointing to the alphabet carpet and stating all of the animals. You CAN read! So, I challenge you…right after you teach your new crew how to sit criss-cross-applesauce and how to line up…teach them the love for reading! Teach them YOUR love for reading along side teaching them that reading is more than reading a chapter book!
Next, I wanted to share my appreciation for what you do! Together we are an army…we are protecting, caring for, teaching, and making a DIFFERENCE! In the hustle and bustle of back to school season don’t forget why you do this…your love for children and your desire to be a life changer…that’s you- -changing the world one little kiddo at a time!
Thanks for such an inspirational post this morning! My back to school anxiety is starting to rise, and this is exactly what I needed to get into a positive frame of mind! 🙂
Love this post! Thanks, Tara!
-Andrea
Thank you for putting things into perspective! Love it! 🙂
This is awesome! Thanks for sharing!
Beautiful!
Fabulous post! I always try to remind my struggling firsties that if they can identify the "golden arches" or their favorite box of cereal at the grocery store, then they can read. And if they learned to read those things, they can learn to read other things! Thank you for reminding us all that true reading starts small, just like learning to talk starts with a phoneme or two, and it isn't always about the letters on the page:) Love this!
SweetSchoolMoments
Wonderfully stated! There are toddlers who can "read" the McDonald arches as the family vehicle drives by, and it's important for our youngest learners to realize that they ARE reading. Great post! I am pinning it to get it out to others now!
~HoJo~
Thank you for these inspiring words! Perfect time for all of us!
Learning at the Teacher Table
You are fabulous and this is a great post! =)
Jessica
Inspiring! I have always started with environmental print on the first day so the students will know that they CAN read. some will say that they can read pictures, but they still don't know how to read words. Or, on the other hand, you can have a student who comes the first day already reading at a third grade level! 🙂
Great post! So true that from day 1 we can inspire our kids to love books and see themselves as readers. There is no greater gift we can give them.