Teresa Costner’s
My own literacy learning experiences has made me into the teacher that I am today. I had a difficult struggle with learning to read and school in general. But because of the help of one teacher who made a difference to me, I now strive to be that one teacher who makes a difference in the lives others. Recalling how I learned to read, how I felt about school, and when I decided that my life would change, has reinforced why I do what I do. My career goal is to change one student much like my sixth grade teacher changed my life. I want to give my students the courage to change and the ability to see how education can transform their lives. I am very thankful that I had a teacher along the way who believed in me. That one teacher may not know it, but he continues to make a difference in the lives of children still today. As a classroom teacher, I can continue to touch the future of students, and I do this as a result of what he did for me.
Sitting in my first grade classroom and seeing a long line of what I now know as letters, lining the wall above the chalkboard in our classroom was my earliest memory of beginning to learn to read. I remember knowing that those curves and lines meant letters, as I had seen them on television in our living room, and on the billboards as our family drove to my grandmother’s house in Virginia. I remember learning how to write the letters and the way they sounded at the same time. We would practice one or two letter each day until we mastered the entire set. After mastering the letters, we started learning word families such as at, sat, fat, and cat. Toward the end of the first grade, our class was introduced to the Dick and Jane reading series.
By the time I reached second grade we continued this series as a class with everyone sitting in a circle. The pages were full of colorful pictures of a little blue-eyed blonde girl named Sally, the younger sister of Dick and Jane, and her yellow striped kitten named Puff. The family’s dog was named Spot and he was of course black and white. The parents were always called Mother and Father – we never learned their ‘real’ names. Dick and Jane were the brother - sister team who led the action and story line in the series.
I recall the books being thin paperback. The contained about five stories in each, and each book progressively became more difficult. The class took turns reading a line or two from each page. I know this technique is called ‘Round Robin’ reading. I did not know then that this type of “scary reading” would be one of the memorable of my childhood learning experiences. It wasn’t until later in my reading journey, that I would have the horrible memories of high, middle, and low group reading. I would always be in the middle or lowest groups, depending upon the grade level and my interest in pleasing my teacher.
I always paid close attention to new words, wondering if my sentences may contain any of these “foreign” words. I especially remember having trouble differentiating “the” and “they”. One of my friends, Suzanne, was always the best reader. She used expression in her reading, long before our attention was draw to the “way” we read as much as reading accurately. I would hope that I would have easy sentences so I would read like Suzanne. Overall, I would say that my initial experience with reading was pleasant, except for those tense moments when I was afraid of forgetting a particular word. As I read aloud with my students in my classroom, I try to remember how scared I was that I would make a mistake. I strive to make my class non-threatening, where everyone encourages each other.
In third grade, my teacher Miss Wilson walked up and down the aisles of children while reading Mark Twain’s Tom Sawyer to our class. She read with expression and changed her voice for the different characters. Details of the book came alive. Each day I anxiously awaited the reading time after lunch when we would continue the adventures of the dynamic duo, Tom and Huck. The most intense memory I have of the book is the chapter when Tom tricks his friends into whitewashing the fence for him. I made the connection between the text and my life when I thought to myself about how I could trick my older brother into doing my chores. I have no other memory of anyone ever reading to me, not my mother nor my father nor any other classroom teacher. Because this was such a pleasant experience for me, I regularly read to my students. I try to choose books that provide intense emotion. I usually read books like Where the Red Fern Grows, Bridge to Terabithia, or A Taste of Blackberries. I want my students to have a lasting memory of the book that Mrs. Costner read to them when they were in the sixth grade.
When I was a young child, my family was struggling financially. We did not have extra money for anything, especially books. One time when I was about ten years old, I went to our dentist and picked up a copy of Highlights, a children’s magazine. Up until that time, I thought that the only reading material available to children was a library book or textbook. I had no idea that publishers actually made a children’s magazine. I use to love the section where you had to find the difference between two very similar drawings. I enjoyed reading the short clips about humorous events in people’s lives too. I never questioned why I had never seen this type of reading material before, but I remember that visits to the dentist were made more pleasurable by reading these wonderful children’s magazines. Because I know that many of my students cannot afford to buy magazines for themselves, I order children’s magazines for each of them every year. Magazines that I have ordered for my students include National Geographic for Kids, Mathemania, and Scope. I remember how much I enjoyed the format of the children’s magazines in my dentist office, and I hope that my students can do the same with the magazines I order for them.
Fourth grade is the first time I recall going to the school library to check out books. We went to the library for 30 minutes each week. The librarian would teach a mini-lesson on how to use the card catalog, how to find a good book, where different types of books could be found, or how to use reference materials. We would scurry about the library looking for that one book we would check out and take home with us for the week. Most of the time I would either never begin reading my selection, or if I did, I would not finish it. I often plagiarized my weekly book reports by listening to what others had said about certain books and using their ideas the following week. I would initially be interested in a book, but lose momentum as soon as the TV was turned on and Andy Griffith’s voice filled my living room. The first book I read from cover to cover was Pippi Longstockings. I remember that she was a lot like I felt. She was on her own, alone, and having to take care of herself. When I was in grade school, my mother worked third shift in a factory, so I never remember her being home with us except on the weekends. She was there I guess, but she was always busy keeping the house neat, cooking meals, washing dishes, and getting things ready for the next morning before she headed off to work. I didn’t realize until I began to write this paper, that all of the experiences I remember about reading that were positive, was when I made a connection from the text to my life. How important is that process when we teach reading today! In my discussions about books with my students, I try to get them to make connections between what they are reading and the world, themselves, or other books they have read or movies they have seen. I know that making these connections makes a difference in the way a student views a book and remembers the impact of the text.
Basal reading books were introduced in grades 4-8. When the basal would cover genres I liked such as folk tales or poetry, I would devour the material. But when we had to read long, boring stories that didn’t relate to me at all, I would wade through the miry matter with very little interest. When our class started grouping for reading, I was in either the middle or lowest groups. I didn’t pay much attention to what was going on, I just knew my friends were in one group together and I seemed to be with what I thought were the slower children in the class. I didn’t realize until then that I was one of the slower children too. When I taught reading to 5th grade academically gifted students, I used the novel approach. I remember how bored I was as a child with the basal reader, and so I taught reading strategies through the use of exceptional novels. My students loved to read novels, and a variety of activities accompanied each one.
The sixth grade marked a distinctive turning point in my educational journey. My teacher, Mr. McDonald, was a wonderful person and teacher. I realized that I was in the next to the lowest group. I could tell because everyone knew who the “smart kids” were and they were with Miss Spainhour. That was my turn around year, because up until then, I never knew I was suppose to study, do homework, read outside of class, or ever think about school once I got off the bus. When our teacher went over homework, I had forgotten until then that we were suppose to have it done before class. Mr. McDonald gave us confidence and expected a great deal from us. He taught us how to study, how to choose a reading book, how to outline chapters to study material; and for the first time ever, my teacher had a sense of humor. He played music in class that related to our course of study. For example, he taught us “Volaire”, an Italian song, during our studies of Italy. While studying the Greek and Roman gods, we created artwork and produced dramas. Long before anyone had heard of Gardner’s multiple intelligences, Mr. McDonald was addressing these outlets with his students. Mr. McDonald gave me the courage to find my weaknesses and work through them. I made significant academic growth in my sixth grade year. By the time I was a freshman in high school, I was prepared for algebra, college level English and accelerated science courses. Reading was no longer a struggle for me, but was instead a pleasurable pastime. I was no longer in the lowest academic classes. I was now; however, a leader in the classroom, taking college bound classes. I would never have been a part this academic plan, had it not been for the patience and strength that one teacher gave me along the way. As a teacher today, I work hard to make a difference in every child’s life. By talking to my students about my sixth grade teacher, and telling them about the type of student I was prior to having Mr. McDonald, I encourage them to take this year and make it their turn around year. Many children have come to me much like the student I was in the sixth grade and have left me as a confident, caring, academically oriented pupil. I see this achievement as a way of paying forward to a wonderful teacher who made a difference in my life.
Once I entered the university, I had to read at a rapid pace just to keep my head above water. I read more pages of history and American literature in one night than I had read in one month in high school. One of my first classes at Appalachian State University was Children’s Literature with Beulah Campbell. This elderly professor taught me the difference between a Caldecott and a Newberry award book. She demanded that her students read an enormous amount of literature and keep an index journal of all that we had read. I was responsible to examine the use of a text in the classroom and how to make it correlate to other areas of study.
As an adult, I read a lot of the children’s books that I had refused to read as a child. I enjoy them immensely and cannot wait to share them with my students and my own children. I have discovered within me, a love for children’s literature. Its sweet innocence, simple story lines, and interesting characters captivate me. Today, I continue to enjoy reading alongside my own children as together we explore this wonderful world through books.
The teachers I had in third and sixth grade, and the university professors I had as an adult all took part in shaping me as a classroom teacher. I love to read to my classes because of Tom Sawyer; I love to make a difference in my students because of Mr. McDonald, and I love children’s literature because of Dr. Campbell. It is amazing to look back at my life and realize how the teachers of my past continue to touch the future through me. I wonder how I will make a difference for my students. What will I leave as my educational legacy?