Growing up reading wasn’t always my thing, but I wasn’t necessarily bad at it either. In fact, when I first started to learn how to read, I was one of the best in my class if not the best. I don’t mean to brag but it is just weird to think that at one point I was pretty invested in reading and would eventually lose my drive for it. I don’t even remember how it happened to be completely honest. All I know was I lost interest in what I was reading at the time and almost gave up on the whole thing as a whole.
In pre-K I had always enjoyed reading Dr. Suess and books of that sort. As I went up in grades, I was always able to find a book series that I liked. Some of these were Geronimo Stilton and Captain Underpants. I guess I liked these because they were fictional, and the characters would do things that I couldn’t, so I saw it as an escape from the real world. But eventually this enjoyment would come to an end. Fourth grade was where I first started to stop enjoying my reading. I would fill my reading log in and just skim the pages or read the back so I could have a general understand of what the book was about. Even though my teacher never really checked up on me to see if I was doing the readings or not my reading level didn’t decline. I got away with not doing the work and moved on to the next year.
Once I got to the fifth grade, I really didn’t like reading at all. This wasn’t because I couldn’t read or anything of that sort. It was because the books I was required to read started to have less and less pictures in them. For me personally I took this as some more work to do. I liked the pictures because they helped me envision what was going on in the story. It helped with my imagination and believing that some things in the story might actually be possible. That wasn’t the only reason why I chose not to read though. I did get lazy and decide that I only wanted to read books like Diary of a Wimpy Kid and ridiculous books like that. My teacher eventually banned us from counting those books to our reading hours. By then I had almost given up completely. It eventually got to the point where I wouldn’t read books and just lied and said I did. I was in need of some big help if I was to ever like reading again.
My teacher eventually caught on so one day she sat me down and asked me what things interested me. I don’t really remember what I said I did and didn’t like but she told me stay where I was and returned a few minutes later with a book in her hand. This book was titled the Lightning Thief. I still remembered when I first saw the book. I was confused because I thought the cover looked boring and I didn’t want to read it at all. This was a series about a boy who was a demi-god and had to return Zeus’s thunderbolt back to Mount Olympus in order to save the world. I ended up falling in love with the series and I was so happy I had found it. I think it was because I felt like I could personally relate to the character since he was from New York City just like me.
If I’m being honest, my opinion on reading itself didn’t change. But I knew that if I found a book that I liked or a character I could relate to then I wouldn’t mind reading at all. I learned to be more open when reading and not give up on a book after the first 10 pages. Of course, there would occasionally be a book that I didn’t like but I’m glad my teacher sat me down that day and showed me how to appreciate reading again.
