If you do one thing today, listen to this. Over the weekend, Pam Allyn spoke with NPR about literacy in the digital age, the power of pleasure reading, and how our new inititative, Open a World of Possible, works to promote and celebrate every child's right to read.
In this 45 minute interview, Pam talks about her own experiences with reading, from childhood discoveries to the magic she encounters today through teaching and travel. I love how she tells students that even she is a struggling reader; she comes across hard passages and get frustrated as an adult reader just like they do.
She also talks about the power variety, how parents and teachers need to model good reading behavior, and the importance of allowing choice. How kids need to experience the freedom of selecting a book because it sounds interesting to them or because the title makes them laugh. Pam said it best when she said "when I read, I’m choosing to read because it matters to me, not because someone told me to do it." Whatever the reason, kids need ownership over their chioces.
