My dear, sweet wife has almost reached the end of her summer vacation. Usually when this happens, she makes a very concentrated list to complete her "things to do" list that she wrote at the beginning of the summer. One of those things to do is to clean up our book shelves.
This is always a challenge for me. Books are like best friends. How do you part with them? Over the years, as we've moved a number of times, I've had to pare back my library. To this day I still lament books that got sold at yard sales or given to Goodwill. So getting rid of books is always a painful experience.
While cleaning yesterday I found a couple of books I picked up at Goodwill (Oh, the irony!). They were a couple of Dick and Jane books, the very books used in my school to help first graders learn to read. One book was entitled, "Something Funny," and the other was "Fun With Our Family."
To this day I still remember the thrill of learning how to read. The authors of the Dick and Jane books really knew how to capture the attention of their young readers: Look, Dick. Look, look. Oh, oh. Look, Dick. Oh, oh. See, Dick. Oh, see Dick.
Left you on the edge of your seat, didn't it?
What resources do schools use today to teach children how to read? I tend to think that Dick and Jane books are considered old hat, so to speak, not to be used to teach modern day children how to read.
But, frankly, when Dick and Jane find Spot playing in the mud, well, could there be anything more amazing and wonderful?
All I know is this - we are not giving to Goodwill our Dick and Jane books!
