Wednesday, May 11, 2011

Skipping Through the Stacks

We are a family that LOVES books. Well, except for a certain adult, but he will remain nameless and actually, he loves that his family loves books. He just has this problem where a book in his hands puts him to sleep. Thankfully all of our children have loved looking at books since their chubby little baby hands first learned how to turn the pages of a board book. We look forward to our weekly trips to the library where we load up. The kids stand at the counter ready to snatch their pile as soon as the books have been scanned. So you can imagine my dismay the first time I took Teshome to the library after he had been home about 3 weeks and he HATED it. We have had some of our worst pouting moments at the library. So, with my work cut out for me, I happily brought home any Curious George or "Buzzy Woody" book I could find. At first he pretended he wasn't interested even though those are his favorite characters. Yup, it didn't take much time being an American and he's already got his favorite animated heroes. A few times I caught him paging through the books I brought home to lure him into "reading" and I wanted to jump for joy, but I pretended I didn't notice. That was all part of my plan. Keep it cool. Don't try to force him to love books. Limit TV time. Have books all over the place (that one is easy around here). He continues to moan and whine when I read for too long- like more than five minutes- as the other kids all sit and listen and ask questions. I realize part of his lack of love here definitely has to do with the fact that he doesn't speak English fluently or understand everything. And it also has to do with the fact that all of the books at the orphanage where ripped and broken and scribbled in and just plain no fun. It's not like he had story time everyday there. So I'll keep working on it. Today, though, I had a beautiful victory in my endeavor to create a bibliophile. We went to the library and he was HAPPY. He searched the stacks, SKIPPING along looking for things that he found interesting. He brought home a book about Australia, a book about hang gliding, a book about New Jersey, and Peter's Chair by Ezra Jack Keats. I was not even bothered by his choices because HE chose books! Yippee!

4 comments:

Wife said...

YAY!! :) My main goal as a teacher every year is to create a love for reading in my students hearts. It works almost 200% of the time with the correct books ;). Glad you had a victory today!

dkt said...

Sounds like two other boys I know... :) It took us a looooong time to get them interested in reading and other bookish stuff. It is not a part of the African culture at all and I think my boys found it quite overwhelming. But they do enjoy stories now, although significantly less than their siblings. Their attention span isn't quite there either. Keep up the good work. :)

cgl said...

Sweet! We can readily identify with you on the whine and moan thing, and we are interested in how you guys have dealt with it considering the circumstances!

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