Have you ever participated in a weekly reading competition? I have, and it has been quite an eye opening moment of my literacy endeavors. A little backstory, when I was in 6th or 7th grade I had an English teacher who truly inspired me a lot. In her class she held weekly reading competitions and if you read a certain amount or more you would get stars accordingly. Every month whoever had the most stars would win a prize as cool as stickers, bookmarks or cool pencils etc.
Initially when she first introduced this to us, I was not that into it and it did not really bother me or motivate me to read. The prizes seemed too normal for me to be reading during my free time instead of playing or watching my ipad. Yes I was an ipad kid, who thankfully got rid of her ipad addiction!
It had been about one month since Ms. Parker first introduced the reading competition to us. The chart so far had been empty with a star here and there for one or two people. The class routine had been the same, the same boring schedule with the same in class readings and writings. I had ignored that chart for a while, completely zoning that section of the room out of my sight. Until that one day, the day when it all went down.
It was a normal day in class, I was sitting on my desk, doing everything possible but paying attention. It was raining that day so of course I’m going to get up and go see a beautiful rainbow that was forming.
That is the day I finally noticed the updated chart. It was next to the windows. It was hard to not see the chart if you were facing the windows, so I went over and finally checked it out.
Heading towards it I was certain that it was still just the same as the last time I saw it, a star here and there for one or two students. I thought to myself “who is even going to take this seriously. All this reading for stickers and pencils”. To my surprise, I saw a lot more stars than I did initially. The closer I got the more stars I kept seeing! This had my stomach in knots. I felt like I was the only one getting left behind. I finally got to the chart and saw one name that had the most stars out of all. She was the one girl that never seemed to have her hand down. She was the type to call out the answers even if the teacher told her to give others a chance. She wasn’t my favorite out of the bunch. So seeing her name with the most stars just made me feel ten times worse. I felt like the room was closing in on me. It seemed like the rainbow that I was so excited to go see was worthless at that moment.
Seeing her getting all the stars made me feel so irked because she would always cut me off when I would raise my hand to participate. And I was already insecure about speaking in english so for her to just cut me off made me extra annoyed at her. the competitiveness in me got awoken. And from that point onwards I decided I would read only to get the stars, not because I enjoyed it.
It was certainly hard at first to find a book that interested me. I would start reading a book and end up getting bored with it within two days. I decided to go talk to Ms. Parker about my problem. Ms. Parker, my English teacher, was a huge Hunger Games fan. She had a whole library at the corner of our classroom with her favorite series and authors. I figured who else to talk to about this then the one who seems so fond of reading. So I went to her the next day during my lunch period. It was just her and I in the classroom at that time. Before this, I never really went to a teacher before or after class. Nor did I ever form a connection with a teacher before Ms. Parker, straight off the bat, as soon as I entered, was so welcoming. I went and told her what was happening and she didn’t make me feel bad about my inability to finish a book. Instead she gave me shorter stories and told me that as long as I’m trying that’s all she cares about. After that day I would go to her classroom during my lunch time because she always had such fun stories to tell, she would tell me about her Grad school, her pets and even about her secret bread pudding recipe.
One day I was helping her reorganize her mini library and found a book called Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone. Ms. Parker told me it was her second favorite series. It looked like it was too much reading, but she encouraged me to read it. I hesitated, because I did not want to disappoint her by giving up in the middle of the book. Especially when she said it was one of her favorites. I told her my concern and she said that I should give it a go, and if I’m unable to finish she will still be proud of me for trying. And so I took the book home.
Spoiler alert, I ended up getting so hooked. And that is how I found out about one of my forever favorite book series! That whole day I could not put the book down! I was reading even after bedtime. I finished the book within a day and a half. I was super thrilled to tell Ms. Parker about my new profoundness. Ms. Parker said she knew I was going to love the book and recommended that I should read the whole series, which surprise surprise, she had the whole collection. I kept reading more and more. I finished the Harry Potter series within a month and moved on to other series such as; Twilight series, Percy Jackson series, etc. I would read nonstop, actually enjoying each and every book I read. I would debrief about the book with Ms. Parker everytime I would finish a book.
At the end of the year, the chart was filled with stars, I saw my name on the chart and next to it was 2 rows of stars, while everyone else, including the girl who was winning, at the start of the competition, only had about a row. But to me, the competitiveness had gone long time ago. I only read because I truly enjoyed it. So even after Ms. Parker announced me as the winner, the happiness was not as much as it was for finally loving to read.
I will forever be grateful to Ms. Parker. She has made such a huge impact in my life and I will forever be so grateful to her for helping me realize that I enjoy reading a lot! And for being the sweet, non-judgemental, and supportive human that she is, I wish I could just say thank you.
Link to Spoken Presentation Slides:
https://www.canva.com/design/DAGAKgrn48c/TbkE3Q-8IxRsgXy8Igvm_A/edit
