Column
By: Kerri Testement
Read to your child —even if you’re busy
It’s 8 a.m. on a weekday and I’m rushing to get things done before going to work.
I’m still not dressed. A shoe for my outfit of the day is missing. The cat is scratching at the back door, begging to come inside. I still need to make something for my daughter to eat. She, meanwhile, is sitting in a diaper that looks like it’s going to bust.
It’s a typical Monday morning. The rush to get things done before rushing to work to get more things done.
And then my 17-month-old daughter crawls to me — with a Dr. Seuss book dragging in one hand behind her. She begs for me to read to her. She doesn’t care that I have things to do, she just wants her mommy to read to her.
So, I sit down on the floor and she crawls into my lap. She has selected “The Foot Book,” a Dr. Seuss piece that I’ve read countless times to her.
“Left foot. Left foot. Left foot. Right. Feet in the morning. Feet at night,” I say to her, as she smiles at the pages. At the end, she asks me to read it again. It’s not uncommon for her to ask to be read a book five or six times in a row. I could recite most of “The Foot Book” without the book in hand — my daughter loves reading.
I believe that children are born to love reading. For younger children, it involves a personal time with their loved ones and encourages language development.
Reading promotes creativity in a world focused on bland, defined standards. How silly it is to say, “Hop. Hop. We like to hop. We like to hop on top of Pop.” And it’s even sillier to read, “Three tree. Three fish in a tree. Fish in a tree, how can that be?” Dr. Seuss was a genius in his simplicity.
It wasn’t until I was in college that I noticed the extreme differences between a child whose parents read to them on a regular basis compared to the mothers and fathers who didn’t open a book with their child.
While a student at UGA, I volunteered at a local after-school program. My job included helping elementary school students with their homework and listening to them read.
It wasn’t hard to spot the children whose parents read to them —those students were more confident and mastered higher reading and language skills at an earlier age.
But for the children who didn’t have an adult reading to them, those students struggled to read simple words aloud from a book. And it seemed like it was one of the few times that an adult would give that child one-on-one attention. Those kids had the intelligence to master reading, but they weren’t fairly given the chance to do so.
It’s easy for parents to blame tight schedules for not reading to their child. It’s even tougher to focus on reading when children get older and become involved in school, extracurricular activities and their friends.
But there are resources to help parents read to their children. Local libraries offer programs — such as storytimes for younger children — that promote reading in a fun environment. Schools sponsor book fairs that feature new books for a discount. And there are plenty of quality used books available at area consignment sales and book warehouses (that’s where most of my daughter’s books come from).
Amid the business of life, my child deserves to have someone take the time to read to her.
Kerri Testement is the news editor of The Braselton News. Her e-mail address is kerri@mainstreetnews.com.
Editorial
MCHS fight raises larger issues
Last week’s brawl at Mill Creek High School probably wouldn’t have been so controversial were it not for a video of the event being made widely available. For many people, including many parents, the video was a window into the world of teenage anger and raised some deeper questions about school security issues in today’s society.
Six students have been suspended for fighting and may face criminal charges.
So how does a school, especially one as large as Mill Creek, provide for a secure environment in a sprawling building on a sprawling campus?
Some years ago, that question wouldn’t even have been asked. There have always been fights in schools. To some extent, there was a “boys will be boys” attitude toward such fisticuffs.
But a number of school shootings, the rise of gangs in suburban areas and other serious violence on school campuses changed that attitude. Now, any kind of fight on school campus is considered serious business.
Not everyone was happy about the now infamous Mill Creek video. Some thought it gave a distorted reflection on the school since it only involved a handful of students; the video was, for a time, even taken down off of YouTube.
Others were upset by principal Jim Markham’s comments that the fight was between a group of “thugs,” a term that has become politically incorrect in some circles.
But Markham was right. While the video of the fight doesn’t reflect the overall behavior in the school, it did show the community a glimpse inside an angry, intolerant and “thuggish” subculture that is prevalent in many schools across the nation. It was obvious in the video that these out-of-control students had absolutely no respect for adult authority. Despite the presence of several adults who attempted to break up the pre-fight mouthing, the event quickly escalated.
While it would now be tempting to over-react to this highly publicized event, in the long run that would be a mistake. Reasonable security measures and alert teachers and students are the best way to prevent minor disagreements from spinning out-of-control.
We cannot, and should not, turn our schools into mini police states with armed guards, vicious dogs and metal detectors. To do that would be to allow the “thugs” to win by intimidation.
Winder is the home of ‘National Doctors Day’
Sunday will mark National Doctors Day and Winder is where it all began. Eudora Brow Almond, the wife of physician Charles B. Almond, presented a resolution to the Barrow County Medcial Society Auxiliary in 1933 proposing a day to honor doctors.
The date of March 30 was chosen since that is the date Crawford W. Long first used anesthesia in surgery in nearby Jefferson. In 1958, the US House adopted a resolution commemorating Doctors Day and in 1991, President Bush proclaimed March 30 at Doctors Day
So this weekend, remember to thank your doctor for his service to his profession and to the community.
And remember, this special day began locally.
