Bernadette snapped this photo of Danielle having her reading lesson today. Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons is one of the few homeschooling resources we have used for all nine of our children, and I wish we had a photo just like this one of every single child learning to read with me.
I purchased our original copy of this book (worn to tatters and replaced) around 1996 when the idea of home education was new to me and our oldest daughter was two years old. Chris and I used to go out to dinner occasionally while my sainted mother and father watched the little ones. We would usually stop by the Barnes and Noble on Austin Street in Forest Hills to browse, always winding up in the children's section. I remember picking up the book and paging through it, but putting it back because the girls were still so very young. I eyed it a time or two more, finally bringing it home. Having that book on the shelf in our apartment made the whole prospect of home education seem so much more real.
It was a year or two before I sat down with our four year old for her first reading lesson. She dutifully repeated the sounds "mmmmm" and "sssssss" and played a game of "say it fast" with me, but when we were finished all of ten minutes later, she said, "Mommy, may I please never take a reading lesson again?"
"Never again? Didn't you like that lesson, honey?"
"No, Mommy, please never, never again."
I was surprised and, quite honestly, dejected. You see, Allie was the type of child who was angelically agreeable, yet truly adamant about refusing things if they struck her the wrong way. When she was just two years old, we read "Curious George Gets a Medal." Something about it rattled her, and she refused to read any book at all for a good six months. It was not until Lissa sent me home one day with the Little House picture book "Dance at Grandpa's" that Allie showed some very slight interest in looking at a book again. I promised if she let me read it aloud to her just once, she would be allowed to stay up a bit later that night. After reading it once, she let me read it to her again, and again, and again. Problem solved forever. Thank you, Lissa.
So there I was, happily embarking upon our journey of home education, and already the leaky, little raft we were on had struck the shore. If I could not teach Allie to read--and could not even give her one brief, gentle lesson--this would never work. I prayed, "Dear Blessed Mother, I thought this was what you wanted us to do, but I've already failed and can't do this. If this is what you want, please help me."
The next day, Allie came skipping into the house from playing outside. "Mommy," she asked, "when is it time for my reading lesson?" Now you may not think this sounds like much of a miracle, but if you knew my little girl, you would know that it truly was. She was not only willing to take lessons, she was unstoppable. I used to bribe her with reading lessons--you read that right, I would bribe her with the lessons, not bribe her to take the lessons. ("Honey, we need to leave the park now." "No, please Mom, not yet." "I'll give you a reading lesson the minute we get home." "Let's go!" You get the idea.) She wanted two or three lessons a day. She completed that book in no time and could read anything. The Blessed Mother doesn't fool around.
My poor second daughter seemed slow by comparison, mastering the book at the ripe old age of five. Looking back on it, I realize she was a prodigy in her own right. Those two first practice children were followed by every sort of reader imaginable--late, cranky, agreeable, brilliant, frustrated, funny. I use those adjectives in no particular order and for no particular child; some of my children fall into more than one.
Today, at the dawn of 2017, I find myself sitting by the fire and teaching the Hundred Easy Lessons for the ninth time. Danielle is very bright, and, being the baby of the family, highly self confident. If she forgets a sound or has trouble with a word, she doesn't fret at all. She turns to me with the brightest dimpled grin and giggles. I love that so much about her.