The Sound of Reading

Today was a VERY big day for Kara! She and I went on an excursion to the local library today to do some research for a project she is doing for Girl Scouts. While there Kara asked if she could go over to the book section that has the reading books for her age group. Every other time we've been to the library she goes immediately to the train table and the other toys that are there for the little kids and she's never shown any interest in actually looking at reading books for herself. So, I assumed it was the same today. I was in for a delightful surprise!

After locating the children's cookbook of international foods that I was hunting for, I found my way back to the area where Kara had asked to go. Even from a distance I saw something different -- she was sitting in a chair at a table looking at --- a BOOK! As I got closer and told her I had found what we were looking for, she politely asked about a word she was having trouble sounding out and then showed me a book she wanted to know if she could check out. The book was a CHAPTER BOOK! in the Junie B. Jones series! For those of you who are unfamiliar with children's books chapter books are books with mostly words and only a few pictures, generally one picture every four or five pages or so, and, as the name suggests -- chapters. Up until now Kara has been a very reluctant reader feeling only confident enough to tackle picture books, primarily Clifford books. She personally would like to be reading books about animals, but she's not allowed to test on those and they are all above her tested reading level. So, for her to ask to check out a chapter book and want to read it herself was a bit of a surprise --- but still not the biggest suprise. I said yes that she could check it out but that she would have to be the one who would read it, not Daddy or I. She agreed and commented that this is what "everyone" in her class is reading. Ok. We'll see how it goes.

We checked it out and got in the car. Where, to my shock, she began reading! The first few words aloud and then silently with focus she studied the page and in the silence in the car you could almost hear the words of this story jumping off the pages of this book and bouncing into her little head. I could see in the rear-view mirror the intent look on her face and the commitment she had to what she was doing. SHE WANTED IT AND IT WAS HERS! She slowed down a couple of times to spell a word to me for help, then kept right on reading. The story had her. The squiggly lines of letters were funny, serious, entertaining -- a world of words on the pages in this funny code called the alphabet. She was reading and she was loving it. After a few pages she started telling me what page she was on -- sharing the amazement she had at her own success.

We arrived at our next destination, another store. Her book came with her. She sat on the floor to read. We got back in the car to come home. The silence of her reading filled the air. It was the most beautiful thing I have seen in a very, very long time!

Tonight it finally happened. For years I had imagined a time when Kara would sit in her bed and read and read and read. I came home from grocery shopping and the house was filled with the same sound that had filled the car earlier today, the beautiful melody of words floating silently through the air from the printed page into the mind.

So, I brought her her glasses... and she smiled and said "I was about to ask for those. "