Think of the things that have had the most profound influence on your life. Some people might cite an event, or a loved one. For me? I would cite books. I read extensively as a child. It's a habit that my mother passed on to me at a very early age. I could cite pediatric articles on how reading can benefit a child for the entirety of this article, but that is not my intent. I mean to use my own life experiences, for what little the short life of one person is worth, to show why you should encourage your children to read.
Growing up here in the Appalachian Mountains, literacy is not typically a thing associated with the population. The stereotype of the illiterate hillbilly has persisted up into modern times. However, illiteracy does not translate to stupidity or even to ignorance. My lifetime passion for literature began even before birth. My mother read to her stomach before I was ever born. Reading was a means of getting me to sleep. Children love stories. And what is a book, if not a story? Everything from the magna opera of great scientists to the most simple children's book has a story to tell. If a child can enjoy a story, then a child can enjoy a book. I was terribly fond of stories.
My mother reading to me early resulted in me being capable of reading around the age of three. The public library in a nearby town, J. Fred Matthews Memorial Library, became a place to grow for me. I would get armfuls of books and read them when I found time in the long summer that is early childhood. I remember things like the Magic Tree House, taught me respect for a great many disciplines. I learned about history and science and mathematics and a myriad of other things. Every page turned contained a new piece of knowledge. Just as watering a plant early on helps it to grow, so did reading help my mind to grow.
After a while, I exhausted anything of interest in the children's section, I decided to take a look over into the adolescent books, where the Harry Potter series that I was sitting. There was a whole new level of slightly more complicated knowledge, a new chapter to my own book of learning. Collecting new vocabulary became a hobby and to this day I cannot stand to see a word and not know the meaning of it.
Flash forward a few years and I had started school. Having already read on most of the things we were learning, I was decidedly quite bored. My rather unwise solution was to read during class, which most teachers took as not paying attention and resented me for. A few however, took it as a good sign, and brought me more challenging books. I remember a Mrs.Wall bringing me copies of Dean Koontz novels to read. I also remember a high school teacher sending copies of Mary Shelly's Frankenstein and Beowulf. Some teachers complimented me on being able to understand topics so quickly, but I was too much of a child at the time to attribute my knowledge to reading. Naturally, I was not terribly popular with others at the time. No one liked the weirdo who constantly had his nose in a book,to which my solution was to retreat into the school library and read even more, which did not help with socialization issues.
On up into middle school I went, with a competition called Battle of the Books as a new source of amusement. I enjoyed it and it also served as a good point to meet other book enthusiasts of my own age. I was at this point exhausting the public library's adolescent section and well into reading the histories and novels in the adult section. I transferred schools just prior to high school. The teachers at my new school had little bias against me. Once I was in high school, may of them helped with the works that really helped shape me into who I am today. I was given The Prince, The Art of War, Atlas Shrugged, The Communist Manifesto, Common Sense Utopia, Leviathan, The Qu'ran, and dozens of other masterworks. These books helped me to grow. Reading them on my own taught me to develop my own opinions on a subject. Above all, it helped me to expand my knowledge.
It is beyond a doubt, that I would not be where I am today without my love of books. I stand, poised to be the first of my family to attain a degree and escape poverty. Ironically, it is through a college project that I now write to communicate this point, using words and grammar acquired through years of reading. I was complimented all through school on being intelligent. Towards the high school years I came to realize that there are no words in the English language to convey how decidedly average I really am. I am remarkably average and enjoy reading. It is to that front that I owe most of my academic accomplishments. Point being; If you have children, introduce them to reading. It harms absolutely nothing and could be a great benefit. With enough reading, even a person as average as I can go a great way in life.
