Daily Reading

In first grade, you get one page of math homework and must read for 15 minutes each night, noting your work in a Reading Log. Today, Lars brought home a book from his classroom to read but he decided, instead, to read from a chapter book about dragons that we have here at home.

Lars is a very good reader but he's not THAT good, so I asked him to do his reading out loud for me. He flipped the book open without hesitation, then paused. "Mama, I'm not wanting to do this reading out loud," he said.

"Oh, no?"

He wrinkled his brow at the pages. "I don't know a lot of these words. The letters are the same but the words are all different," he observed.

"That might be a hard book to read out loud, then. Maybe you could try the book you brought home from school first?"

With a sigh, he went to retrieve the book from school. When he was done reading me the book, he made his log entry dutifully but with a hint of a flourish. "Did you know that I will get a sticker on the chart in my classroom if I read at least FIVE books a night?"

"Five? A night?" If so, they've upped the ante considerably from the five per week mark the first grades used when Ross went two years ago. "Do you think it might be five per week? I think five each night is a lot to ask."

He shook his head at me sincerely, "It is five books for each night and I can do it! I really can!" To illustrate this, he sprinted upstairs and returned with a Curious George - the one about the pizza - and began to read. Halfway through, he stopped. "Pizza for dinner is a great idea, Mama. We should take the advice of this book. It's really good advice!"

Does anyone have a copy of Curious George and the Canadian Baked Eggs I can borrow, fast?