Response to Nancie Atwell’s The Reading Zone, Chapter 1.

I find myself thinking back to when I was a young student, when my love for reading began. Unfortunately, all I remember about reading at all, in the school setting, is that there were Blue Birds, Red Birds, and other “creative” names for reading groups. I can even remember what group I was in, you’d think I would remember that as insignificant as it is. I do know that I can’t remember not loving a good book. It has always been a part of our home. It’s so funny that my mother, who really didn’t stress academics at all, created an environment now the envy of teachers. Mom created an environment where reading was a part of the daily routine, a part of our family relationship. She created in her daughters a love for reading. To this day, my sister who has five children still reads. It sounds weird to point out that someone reads, but I’ve found that it’s somewhat normal for people not to read once they don’t have to for school; many of my students say they don’t have any books at home. I say all of this to say, if I can be a part of creating that love of reading, that routine of reading, in my students’ lives, I would consider it a privilege.

I believe it’s important to create the environment of reading in the classroom, the environment where there’s not assignment attached to what’s being read, just reading for the joy of reading. I find myself, throughout this chapter (and many of Nancie Atwell’s teachings) struggling with the two sides of myself, the ideal and the realistic. Ideally all of my students would love to read and would naturally grow as readers just by reading but the realist in me can’t help but wonder if I can really provide that environment while teaching practical strategies for comprehension and application.

I have a suggestion box in my classroom and I make a point of drawing from it on Fridays. Dare I forget, the kids remind me, so it must be important to them. One of the suggestions I recently pulled said “Give us more time to read.”. Yes, tears came to my eyes, in part, because my kids wanted to read and how exciting is that? But, I admit, some of those tears were for the “How I am I gonna get everything done that is expected of me if I give them more reading time?” More reading time won out, but my other problem still exists.

I really like when Atwell sets up the classroom scenario for us, the relationship she seems to be building with her students through literature. I have a student, Ashleigh, with whom I have developed a wonderful, literary relationship with. We discovered early on that we both liked the same book, so I gave her a biography on the author. Since, she and I read his books at the same time and talk about them on a regular basis. I can tell that she truly understand what she’s reading and enjoys it. In my “mini-conversations” with her, I am able to assess her too (on accident). I was taken back a bit when I read Atwell’s statement “When reading is meaningful, understanding cannot be separated from decoding.” I read it over and over and wasn’t sure what I thought about that. However, my relationship with Ashleigh is helping me make practical application to the concept. I still have reservations though, is this an achievable goal and a realistic form of measurement ” with twenty-nine students?