By Julie K. Buzbee (St Joseph News-Press) November 2002
(Picture by Joseph Beaher/St. Joseph News-Press)
�I think last year it was close to 10,000 pages,� Mrs. Olson says.
And Ethan�s sister, Hannah, 8, is nipping at his heels, she adds.
�Since the day Ethan and Hannah were born, I read to them,� she says.
Emy Karns, books manager at Hastings Books, Music and Video, says that�s what it takes.
�I have kids that will read just anything they can get their hands on. I�m sure they�re the ones who were read to before they could read,� she says.
That is definitely key, says Sue Edson, library assistant at Carnegie Library.
�There are two things,� Ms. Edson says. �One is read to them. Start when they�re very, very young. Make reading a habit.�
For the Olsons, the reading routine is a big part of every day.
The family commutes to St. Joseph daily from Stewartsville, Mo., and that time on the road is often spent reading, Mrs. Olson says.
�Both are blessed with being able to read in the car,� she says of her kids.
And at the end of the day when they get home from school, the television set doesn�t come on until homework and reading are finished, she says, adding that their dad also gets home from work late.
�It just got to be a habit with them and now � they just want to know everything,� Mrs. Olson says.
But not all kids who are read to latch on to reading the way the Olson kids do.
Ms. Edson and Dee Zvolanek, children�s librarian at River Bluffs Regional Library downtown, say their own children aren�t big readers now, but that doesn�t mean that they won�t be at some time in their lives.
�The kids still remember the books I read to them. I�ve instilled enough how much pleasure I�ve gotten out of it,� Ms. Zvolanek says of her own love of reading.
�When they hear about a subject, they explore it,� she says about her children, ages 15 and 19.
Ms. Edson currently is working on her grandchildren.
�I�m trying to instill it in my grandkids now,� she says. �I read to them all the time.�
Although math is highly valued, reading is the most important skill children need to develop in their lives, says Jennee Barnes, principal at King City elementary school.
�Without a strong reading development experience, students continue to suffer in all subject areas,� Ms. Barnes says, adding that she wants to see more emphasis placed upon teaching reading in grades kindergarten through three.
�Teachers in K to 3 are cheated of too much time out of total instructional time available for many different things,� she says, citing character education, theme days, counseling and science as examples.
�Teachers do not get enough time to develop good fluency in children (average to low children). After fourth grade, students are expected to read more material and then apply the information to different tasks. This is when students struggle and some fail,� she says.
Ms. Barnes started a family literacy program at her school and helped write a grant that is funding the program.
�The teachers are hungry for this parental involvement and are extremely motivated to seek improved attendance at each event,� she says.
Libraries are another source for literacy events in communities with story times and after-school and summer reading programs often being offered. And more and more new children�s books are providing material for those programs, says Karen Schultz, children�s librarian at Washington Park Library.
�There�s such a huge selection now, where there didn�t used to be,� she says, adding that some of her personal favorites are by Lisa Campbell Ernst and Lois Ehlert.
The libraries all make an effort to buy the Newberry and Caldecott award winners, as well as Missouri Building Blocks books, Ms. Schultz says.
Ms. Barnes says her favorite children�s author is Dr. Seuss, while Ms. Edson praises Eric Carle, Jez Alborough and Robert Newton Peck.
Ethan, however, says he likes historical novels that Ms. Zvolanek says are popular.
�I really like the �Dear America Diaries,�� he says. �They�re not real, but the person they�re on is real. They teach us some history.�
But Ethan also still remembers the books he was read to as a young child and easily lists his favorites: �I�ll Always Love You� and �Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day.�
Mrs. Olson says she hears good things that have come about from her kids� reading habits.
�Ethan�s teacher told me he was a sponge,� she says, �just waiting to learn something new all the time.�