How do you read?

I have two instagram accounts, a personal account that I have had since I got my first iPhone (back when you could only get the app if you were using an iPhone) and a classroom account.  My posting is pretty sporadic on both at times. but one thing is pretty apparent when you scroll through both...I LOVE books!  I do not discriminate against any form of book either.

My reading journey has followed the path of least resistance really.  I learned to read in Kindergarten, WAY back in 1979!  Since then it's sort of ebbed and flowed, but I never remember having a point where I didn't like reading.  I was that kid in elementary school who took home the reading log in the summer and came back at the beginning of the next school year wanting to win the prize for the most books read.  I won that prize too...more than once.  I can't tell you how many Pizza Hut personal pan pizzas I consumed as a kid because of the Book It program!  Books were entertainment for me; a way to put myself into a world that was different from my own.  We didn't have a TV in our house (religious mother) for a number of years while I was growing up, so books were how we entertained ourselves.

I did have a few years as a young adult where I didn't read as much.  When I graduated from high school and started working I didn't have much time.  More correctly, I was enjoying being on my own too much so I didn't make the time.  After I got married and started having kids I found myself with more time on my hands since I was staying home with them.  I started reading Historical Romance and I would devour books as quickly as I could get my hands on them.  Luckily I had a cousin and an aunt who loved to read so we would round robin all the books we bought.  My cousin introduced me to Paranormal/Urban Romance. This increased my reading as well for a couple years, but I soon got busy with kids and other things and stopped reading for a while.

When I joined Facebook I started hearing about this book about vampires that all the moms my age were reading, and I was lost once again.  Say what you will about how horribly written the series is, but this book brought Young Adult literature into focus and pulled in a generation of readers (moms) who had previously stopped reading like I had.  From the time I picked that book up and sped through what was already finished of the series I have not stopped reading.  I even had a book review blog for a couple of years.  Free books from publishers and authors are pretty awesome for an avid reader like myself!

I joined Goodreads in 2010 and have read nearly 1000 books since then.  I try to read 100 books a year, but some years are more, some less.  I am always reading something, which is where the digital part of reading comes in.

It was probably close to 10 years ago when I discovered Kindle.  It was truly a wonder to think that I could carry around all these books in one small(ish) device.  Let's be honest, the first Kindles weren't so small.  They had buttons like an old Blackberry since there were no touchscreens then.  I loved that thing!  Since then I have upgraded a few times.  I have owned three Kindles.  I upgraded to the touchscreen when it released and then a Kindle Fire once I realized that I could watch movies on that one.  I do still occasionally use the Fire, but now I tend to just use the app on my iPad.

I have not, however, given up print books.  I did go a few years without buying any when I first got my Kindle.  It soon became apparent that not only do I like to read, I like to buy and own books!  It's not uncommon for me to have them in both formats.  I have another confession...I like really big books.  I bought the Night Angel trilogy by Brent Weeks in a bind up version that is close to 1500 pages long.  I carried that thing around with me and managed to read quite a bit of it, but I started noticing this weird bruise on my thigh.  I realized that it was from where the spine of the book was digging into my lap when I was reading it...weird, right?!  I ended up getting the Kindle version so I could read it on my Surface tablet, and so the bruise would go away.  I probably have close to 3000 books in Kindle format now.  Many of those books I also have in print either at home or in my classroom library.  I think it may be an obsession!

I have a book, or a couple hundred books with me ALL the time.  I am reading several books at a time ALL the time.  I am always reading something in print and something digitally ALL the time.  I do this because I know that no matter where I am I can pull out my book or my phone to read when I have a free moment.  It drives my husband crazy when we are at a stoplight and I start reading on my phone.

In my class we do independent reading for the first 10 minutes of every class period. In my classroom I always read in print.  I do this because I think it's important for my students to see that I am reading. They see me holding myself to the standard that I am setting for them, so they are more likely to follow suit.  I walk around with my book and I read while they do.  Lately I have been reading Flannery O'Connor, Eudora Welty, or any of the countless books I am reading for comps, but occasionally I will read something fun that I have checked out during our library time.

Our school does have 1:1 technology, but I don't let my kids read digitally during independent reading time.  Mostly because I don't trust them to be reading when they have their computers open, but partially because I do think that in this digital world it's important for them to develop a love for books.  They are on devices all the time and I want just this short bit of time every day where they have to put them away and focus on learning to find that entertainment between the pages of a book that they are holding in their hands.  If just a handful of students every year are able to develop or maintain a love for reading I am one happy teacher.