I hear Alaska reading

I need some assistance and hope you can help. It won’t take money, just a letter.

In “I Hear America Reading,” Jim Burke shares the wonder of a letter he wrote to his local newspaper. The open letter to the editor asked people to share their stories of why and what they read with his at-risk sophomores. “I Hear America Reading” is a collection of those letters. That’s when I thought of my kids at Wasilla Middle.

Just like Burke, I have a whole bunch of kids who hate to read. This might be referred to as job security, but if true, it is a sad security. Take yesterday for instance, when one of my seventh-grade students wrote:

“How would I know what this book is about? I have never read a book. I hate reading. This book makes no sense to me and I think it’s lame. It’s one idea then another. There’s no point. If you like reading and you got no books then tell me what you want to read … then I will go and ask a friend if he read anything like it. If he did then I’ll send one to you.”

Our kids are in the middle of a long war that’s known as “the reading war.” Battle lines have been drawn on how to teach reading, words alone vs. the love of reading alone. But the generals in this war do not often pause and ask “why do we read?” Do we read, as C.S. Lewis says, “to know that we are not alone?” Is it because, as Muriel Rukeyser’s writes, “the universe is made of stories, not of atoms?” Or do we read purely because there is no other way?

The purpose and delight for reading doesn’t work on a timeline and is not necessarily a seventh-grade phenomenon. People enter the wonders of reading at all different points in life. Some find it while giggling with Dr. Seuss. Others enter on storms with “The Old Man and the Sea.”

However, time is of the essence for the 21st century. Kids are increasingly looking away from books for their information, for their distraction and for their experiences. What a loss it would be if this generation knew how to read, but chose not to. Unfortunately, my student reveals that too many students simply bypass reading

altogether.

Thus, my SOS to you: I ask you to write to my seventh-graders about why and what you read. Let them hear Alaska read.

The tales of a favorite children’s book is as important as is the story of my husband, a first-generation Hungarian who learned to read and speak English on the fly. “You wanna know why I read? I read to fill in the blanks. It’s the only thing that gives you the truth,” he said.

Please help by sharing your story of reading. Send your letters to me, Emily Forstner, Wasilla Middle School, 650 Bogard, Wasilla, AK 99654, or email: emily.forstner@matsuk12.us. I promise it won’t be a story wasted. Your letter may very well make the

difference.

Emily Forstner teaches Language Arts at Wasilla Middle School.