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Read-Aloud
I remember loving teacher read-alouds in the primary grades. Listening to the stories and seeing the pictures always got my imagination going. -
Book Fairs
School bookfairs were highly anticipated, I would always spend 2 months allowance, which my parents would usually match. -
Local Library
I was fortunate enough to grow up in a city with an outstanding library. I remember it had tens of thousands of books and was two-stories. I loved going there on Saturdays with my mom and spending hours reading and selecting titles to check out. -
Great Illustrated Classics
My grandmother would get me Great Illustrated Classics volumes for Christmas. They exposed me to a lot of great classics that might have been too dense for someone my age. My favorites were Treasure Island and Robin Hood. -
School Library
Being a big reader, while a student in junior high, I worked in the school library as one of my electives. I not only got to read a lot, but discovered many good reads by talking with others. -
Comic Books
I discovered comic books and my reading experience was changed forever. They captivated me and made me want to become a comic book creator, it led to so many interests from writing, to drawing and art, to science fiction. -
Movie Books
I loved the cinema, and whether it was reading a movie adaptation or the original book a movie was based on, my favorite movies usually led to me reading. At 15, I remember reading Jurassic Park after seeing the movie, by far the longest and most advanced book I had read up to that point. -
Science Fiction Books
After seeing the film 2001: A Space Odyssey for the first time, my interest in hard science-fiction blossomed, and just like comic books years earlier, I became obsessed with all things science fiction, especially books. "Rendezvous with Rama" by Arthur C. Clark is still one of my favorite books of any genre. -
Killing Time
While deployed overseas, to pass the downtime, I read. A lot. I probably read at least a dozen books over two deployments, everything from "The Da Vinci Code" to "Dante's Inferno" to "Tropic of Cancer". -
Philosophy Texts
My B.A. and M.A. are in Philosophy and while studying I read a great number of Philosophical works. As anyone whose read even an elementary philosophy text can tell you, they are extremely dense. Thankfully, given my history of, and appreciation for reading, I was not only prepared for the challenging books, but enjoyed most of them. -
Back in the Classroom
Becoming a teacher and finding myself back in a school classroom were reading is so integral, I've been reminded of the joy of reading. I have read more books for fun in the last two years than in the 10 years previous. Whether its reading with, or for my students, or dusting off some of my old sci-fi classics, I've rediscovered the pleasure and thrill that a good piece of writing can provide.