In which I realized that it is not necessary to “teach” reading

We were living in California when Aparna was five. She had been going to a pre-school for three years. There was no reading or writing taught at her pre-school. I was busy with a multitude of things and didn’t have the time to sit down to teach her either. Looking back, my inability to teach her proved to be fortuitous.

At some point around this time, Aparna suddenly expressed a great deal of interest in learning to read. She would bring her tiny books, sit on the kitchen counter as I worked, and with complete focus try to figure out the letters and words. In the beginning, she would badger me for help with almost every word she came across. It was a surprise to me that she had begun to do this without ever having completely “learned” the alphabet but in a short time she was sight-reading small words. So complete was her absorption in this new activity, she read nearly all day and everywhere, making sure to even carry some books in the car as we went about our daily lives.

It was clear to me that her reading didn’t follow a linear curve. She didn’t have a way to “grade” the books: to her reading a “level 1” book was the same as reading a “level 3” one, as long as the picture in the cover interested her. A lot of times when she stumbled upon either new or difficult words, I heard her substitute those words with other words she knew – sometimes matching the context and other times not so much. When she had a burning interest in a story she was reading, she even refused to listen to our bedtime stories, preferring instead to finish her own reading. This way, her interest and ability to read grew steadily for about six months.

One day she came to me holding in her little hands our paperback copy of “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone”. She wanted me to read it to her. Children often want to emulate older siblings, so her interest perhaps came from the fact that Abhi was at that time reading the second Harry Potter book. My immediate response was, “Aparna, you are too small for this book. You won’t be able to understand most of it”. She insisted I “just” read the first 10 pages to her, which I happily did. After that I moved on to my work in the kitchen. She was back in about 15 minutes, eyes red and looking obviously exhausted. She caught her breath to tell me, “Amma, I have read the 11^th page. Now, will you read the 12^th page for me?” I didn’t believe what I just heard. My inner voice said, “How could she have read and understood this book?” Again I was thinking linearly and she wasn’t. I picked up the book and started with a quick recap of the happenings on page 11. Clearly surprised by the wasted gesture, she impatiently said, “Amma, I have already read page 11. Go on to the next page!” She just needed to know what happened on page 12. And that interest kept her going.

Aparna is almost seven now and continues to be an avid reader. She stays at home with us, doesn’t go to school. We enjoy doing a variety of things together as a family – music, community gardening, cooking, reading/writing, playing etc.
-- Hema