Reading to Enjoy

The English Language Arts curriculum at Trinity Episcopal School supports the development of a life-long love of reading.  While we must attend to the perennial pedagogy that moves students from “learning to read” to “reading to learn,” we also stress “reading to enjoy.”  The amount of reading a child does outside of school has a positive impact on vocabulary, reading comprehension, verbal fluency, as well as general working knowledge.  It’s no overstatement to say that reading makes a person smarter. 

Thanks to the generous gift of TES Board Vice-President Jere Pederson and to the strong support of the school’s Annual Fund, we are expanding our e-reader program into 5^th Grade by the end of this month.  This gift should go a long way toward encouraging the love of reading.

The first book that our 5^th Graders will be asked to read with the new technology will be Wonder by R.J. Palacio.  Published earlier this year by Alfred A. Knopf, this is a gem of a book.  Wonder is told in a fast-paced, often humorous way, but it calls forth some pondering about human character….both at its worst and at its best.  The book centers on the life of 10-year-old Auggie Pullman who begins his 5^th Grade year at a private school after having been home-schooled to that point.  Auggie is intelligent and resilient but visibly different; he was born with extreme facial abnormalities that have shaped his life and the lives of those around him.  The book is skillfully told from the perspectives of various people, so the reader gets to stand inside the shoes of multiple characters.  To see how people can see things very differently is always a powerful learning!  To me, the story of the book embodies this C.S. Lewis quote: “…what you see and hear depends a good deal on where you are standing; it also depends on what sort of person you are” (From The Magician’s Nephew).  Will you laugh, will you cry, or will you be completely surprised by the…….?  No spoiler here!

Faithfully,

The Rev. David C. Dearman

P.S. Our Fall Scholastic Book-fair has been scheduled for Eaton Hall September 26 through October 5.  This is one of my favorite school fundraisers because it helps get books into the hands of children and encourages independent reading.