The Bookworm

My daughter is a total bookworm. I like to read, but she gets this intense love of reading from her Dad. She started out slow and has gained momentum over the years. Now, in the third grade we can't find novels fast enough. She has been known to read up to 200 pages a day. At her school there is a weekly reading log for recording the minutes they read. I don't actually want to record the real time she reads, because it looks too crazy. She reads on car rides, while I work out at the gym, and tries to read every where we go. I have to hang on to her so she won't run into the wall or a cart in the grocery store. A few weeks ago, she told me what reading does for her.... " Mom..when I read, I am transported into another world and I am there in the story and it is like so fun!"

Last year the school librarian held a reading contest. For the next week the bookworm read for hours at a time, meticulously recording every minute on scraps of paper. She insisted I staple all the sheets and scraps of paper together to turn into the librarian. The Librarian was a little flustered that the bookworm had read so many minutes in the first week..oops. She hadn't even given out the reading record forms yet.. double oops. I received a note that was slightly tense and telling, stating that I had to use the required forms to record the minutes or they would not be counted, and that it was not fair to the other children. Did I already say..oops?

Later I found out the librarian had contacted my daughter's teacher slightly upset that someone had read all the minutes in the first week. The teacher vouched for her stating she really was a bookworm and gently reminded the librarian that the goal was for children to read. Needless to say she won the contest, and I was relieved when it was over.

"I would be most content if my children grew up to be the kind of people who think decorating consists mostly of building enough bookshelves." ~Anna Quindlen, "Enough Bookshelves," New York Times, 7 August 1991