Wednesday, March 08, 2006

Reading with my girls...

I always knew, even before the girls were born that I would love reading to them. Not a big surprise exactly. I teach first grade. I LOVE to read and I LOVE children's books. Put my daughters and books into one moment - aaaaaaaaah...

We take turns choosing the books. Sometimes they choose, sometimes I choose. They always get to choose what order the books are read. Their current favorites are Ruby and Max books by Rosemary Wells. We read all five of them every night. Becca often reads them with me and I'm so amazed with the questions she can answer. :o) Some old favorites are the Wishy Washy series by Joy Cowley. Haley loves to sit on my lap while I twist her around saying, "wishy washy, wishy washy". She asks for it again, and again. Amazingly, I don't get sick of reading it.

I think my current favorite is "Mama, Do You Love Me?" I read the book in the daughter's and mama's voices. At the end the mama says, "I will love you forever and for always because you are my dear one." When I read it though, I point to Becca and then I add - and you, and point to Haley - are my dear ones. They beam everytime - as if I were telling them I love them for the very first time. I live for that beam. :o)

I love that they love books as much as I do. You can find either one of them at any given part of the day sitting with a book, telling the story of the pictures. I can even hear Becca in her crib at night. She'll open a book and say, "Once upon a time..." What a gift!

I enjoy so much reading to them now, and I don't wish these days away for a minute. But I'm definitely looking forward to all of the amazing literature we'll share as they get older. There are so many books I don't want them to miss. So many stories for us to get lost in together. And then we'll be able to start chapter books... :o)

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Reading to Jack is one of my very favorite activities in the whole world. And now we have a whole new world to explore...he's reading, so at night he gets to decide whether he wants to read himself or for me to do it (it's usually 50/50). Our current favorite is The Family Book by Todd Parr...he read it to me tonight!

ramblingmuse said...

I LOVE reading to my nieces and nephew! I just love the way you can 'see' their imagination churning away at the words and the pictures, the way they take it all in.

I also look forward to day when we can enjoy those classics together - James and the Giant Peach, Ralph and the Motorcycle, Cricket in Times Square, Trumpet of the Swan, etc.

:-)

Mrs. G.F. said...

I love the concept of reading chapter books to my girl. I can hardly wait.

The hardest thing about being an 'ex' teacher? Not being as up on the literature, I love kids books and miss being around them, talking about them etc.

Your girls sound adorable!!

M said...

I'm glad others love it as much as I do. :o)

SM, I'm happy to talk about the latest literature anytime. Let me know! :o)

b said...

I have a different take on reading to your girls. They know their books a little too well, if you ask me.

Take today, for example. I was babysitting them, and Becca asked me to read to her. The book was called, "The Little Mermaid's Christmas." ( or something like that.)

Now, this is a long book, full of annoying phrases. I tried to skip a word, or a sentence, or at one point, a page.

But this did not fly with Miss Becca. No, she pointed out what I missed and made me go back and correct myself!

The other book she had me "read" was a book of colors. Each page was filled with objects in different colors. I would say the color and then ask Becca what the items were.

"That's not how you do it!" she'd yell. "you need to read the words!"

reading is overrated :O) (Just kidding, of course!)

b said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
M said...

Thanks for sharing B. Got a good laugh from that. :o)

Anonymous said...

Thanks for an encouraging post! I'm a big proponent of kids loving books myself, and it just makes me happy to read stories like yours. Thanks!