Aussie Readers discussion
You and Your Books!
>
What started your love for reading and/or writing?
Mod
Christine by Stephen King
That's a story that is the top of the list Sandy!!! I loved Christine as well, but I was older than 12 when I read it!
Mod
Me too Brenda! I also loved the Trixie Belden series when I was a..."
Ahhh... Trixie Belden :)
I'm pretty sure my love of reading came from all the Roald Dahl books I read when I Was younger. The Twits, James and the Giant Peach and the BFG will always have a special place in my heart and I can't wait for my little man to get old enough to start to enjoy these as well.
Michelle wrote: "I'm pretty sure my love of reading came from all the Roald Dahl books I read when I Was younger. The Twits, James and the Giant Peach and the BFG will always have a special place in my heart and I ..."Hi Michelle,
Many of the young students I teach LOVE the Roald Dahl books. I am rather pleased about that because apart from being great stories the use of language is excellent for improving their vocabulary and their own writing skills.
A firm favourite is The Magic Finger. I love that one too and no matter how many times I read it with different students I still enjoy it.
Dahl was certainly a master storyteller.
JB :-)
Reading: so many wonderful children's books, including the Paddington ones, Mary Poppins, Josephine and her Dolls, The Wind in the Willows, Peter Pan, Alice in Wonderland, Little Women, What Katie Did etc etc.
Writing: at first, wanting to make a big point. Then, having worked as a journalist, I fell in love with telling stories. Also, wish-fulfilment. The latest, Flower Girl, is my own What if? fantasy!
Writing: at first, wanting to make a big point. Then, having worked as a journalist, I fell in love with telling stories. Also, wish-fulfilment. The latest, Flower Girl, is my own What if? fantasy!
My parents were both avid readers and Mum taught us all to read at age 3. We did not have a television till I was 10; that was my parent's choice so it was read, play or zip! so I guess it started there. Also personally for me, I stuttered so reading was actually easy compared to anything else.I majored in Eng Lit at uni and then did Journalism so I guess the written word is just 'it' for me. I consider myself very lucky:)
I have no glorious Tolkien memories of childhood reading, only a hell of a lot about Goosebumps and the BSC. I have a soft spot for Tolkien and always will, but those two series were the ones that got me into reading.
Tanvi wrote: "I have no glorious Tolkien memories of childhood reading, only a hell of a lot about Goosebumps and the BSC. I have a soft spot for Tolkien and always will, but those two series were the ones that ..."I know a few teachers grumbled about the goosebumps series (even though sold through schoolastic) as not good for children - but my non-reading child actually read a few of them so at the time I was as happy as Larry that she was actually reading!!
They were a great start :)
Mod
Brenda wrote: "My son loved the Goosebumps series.."Haha me too. That and Redwall.
Probably being read to every night even after I could read myself. I think it helped growing up in an age when there weren't all day kids' tv show, videos, DVDs, computers and other electronic entertainment devices to distract me. My childhood favourites were Enid Blyton books, Kathryn Kenny Trixie Beldon books and Julie Gordon & the New Guinea Smugglers by Estelle Grey which I borrowed from the school library so many times the librarian wouldn't let me borrow it again.
Mod
Brenda wrote: "She should have let you keep it Kim!"Sadly she didn't and it was out of print. Miraculously years later I found it on eBay. Haven't read it though - might destroy my fond memories. Perhaps one day.....
Mod
Sadly she didn't and it was out of print. Miraculously years later I found it on eBay. Haven't read it though - might destroy my fond memories...."
Always nice to have a book you remember loving, even if you don't read it again...save it for your children and grandchildren;)
Can't remember any seminal reading or writing stories...was always doing both from time immemorial. I do remember one funny little story though that may have pushed me towards being a writer...Around my 9th or 10th birthday I was (as usual) trying to guess what my mother had bought for me. Also as usual, she was giving me clues and I was plaguing her with questions to get more clues. Like most kids, I was always looking for ways to acquire money, so one of my questions was: Can I make money with it? Her answer was Yes, and I got quite excited.
When I finally unwrapped the prezzie...it was a pen.
Mod
Brenda wrote: "Haha!! That's classic Adrian! Love the inventiveness of your Mum:)"Yes, good story. Sometimes I think mothers can be prophetic as well as inventive.
Like Adrian, I cannot remember a time when I wasn't reading even though I often had to be resourceful (and sometimes inventive) in my efforts to acquire reading material.
My parents believed that books were better for us so we didn't have a television till I was 10. All my 4 sisters and I all read at age 3; Mum taught us. We had a proper library room in our house, as you got older you worked your way through the books. I read a A.A. Milne poem about Alexander and his Beetle' and I was a goner:) I still love that poem:PI found a little beetle; so that Beetle was his name,
And I called him Alexander and he answered just the same.
I put him in a match-box, and I kept him all the day ...
And Nanny let my beetle out -
Yes, Nanny let my beetle out -
She went and let my beetle out -
And Beetle ran away.
She said she didn't mean it, and I never said she did,
She said she wanted matches and she just took off the lid,
She said that she was sorry, but it's difficult to catch
An excited sort of beetle you've mistaken for a match.
She said that she was sorry, and I really mustn't mind,
As there's lots and lots of beetles which she's certain we could find,
If we looked about the garden for the holes where beetles hid -
And we'd get another match-box and write BEETLE on the lid.
We went to all the places which a beetle might be near,
And we made the sort of noises which a beetle likes to hear,
And I saw a kind of something, and I gave a sort of shout:
"A beetle-house and Alexander Beetle coming out!"
It was Alexander Beetle I'm as certain as can be,
And he had a sort of look as if he thought it must be Me,
And he had a sort of look as if he thought he ought to say:
"I'm very very sorry that I tried to run away."
And Nanny's very sorry too for you-know-what-she-did,
And she's writing ALEXANDER very blackly on the lid,
So Nan and Me are friends, because it's difficult to catch
An excited Alexander you've mistaken for a match.
Mrs. Furnell - Grade 2 teacher. She introduced me to the Magic Faraway Tree. I was hooked from the get go.
Both my parents read. Mum would never throw a book out, so we always had a house full of books. The first book I remember reading was The Water Babies when I was six, but I think it was too hard for me. I could read the words, but I didn't understand it. Also when I was six, my Aunty bought me The Sam Pig Story Book which I read through numerous times. That was more my level!I've always found reading to be an escape from whatever is going on in my life. When I was at University for example, I read Thomas Hardy. I figured at least I wasn't as miserable as all his characters! During exam time, I read Sir Walter Scott. It let me get away from study without letting my brain turn off too much.
Mod
That's gorgeous Bette! I hadn't heard that one before, but very cute:)
Mod
Great book, The Magic Faraway Tree and the series as well:) My grandson loves the stories too...he started having them read to him probably about age 4 or 5:)
I had a typewriter when I was a kid, spent hours upon hours writing sprawling, nonsensical sagas.
I was (still am) a bad sleeper - my parents used to tell us if we couldn't sleep to read a book and not wake them up. My parents also understood the importance of reading to us at a young age. It stuck with me throughout life and I still have all my books I had as a child including the lovely Christopher Robin Verse Book my Kinder teacher gave me when I went off to school. I always give books as baby presents too.
Oh yes, Enid Blyton for me as well:)
Parents reading me books and my mother teaching me to read at 4 year old. from then on books have been a constant in my life.
The Secret Garden. At least, that's the first book I remember being "transported" to, being able to see it and live it.As for writing, I don't think I can pinpoint it, but even before I could write I would make up stories, some of them still run through my mind on occasion. They're some of my earliest memories.
Was only talking about this with mum recently, how we used to read together when I was very little (kindy/reception age), and because they didn't know I couldn't see anything at that stage, I would memorise the story when mum read it to me so that when I read it back I just had to look at the pictures and remember what the words were that went with them.I lasted until Year 2 doing that. Then the teacher noticed that I couldn't see anything on the blackboard :P
Mod
Oh dear, you poor thing! Are your eyes okay now?
Brenda wrote: "Liam wrote: "Was only talking about this with mum recently, how we used to read together when I was very little (kindy/reception age), and because they didn't know I couldn't see anything at that s..."Oh yeah I just needed glasses.
Mod
Glad that's all it was:)
My mother started reading to me when I was in the womb. And every Christmas and every birthday the only thing I wanted was a new book. We were very poor, so I was given secondhand books - and this grew into a love of secondhand bookshops which I still love to this day. Long dark aisles, overcrowded bookshelves, rickety wooden floors, spiderwebs in spooky corners and that aroma of old books... mmmm... nothing better!!!
My dad used to read us Grimm's fairy tales (in Dutch, they were called sprookjes) as bedtime stories, three sisters in a double bed, and he would do all the voices, it's a really fond memory, that must be where it started, I reckon.
Both of my parents encouraged me to read from an early age and were always supportive. I think my love of reading was fostered from our weekly routine as young kids. Every Friday evening we would go to the small branch of the Camberwell Library located in the Canterbury Gardens, and we would return our old ones then select our new books. Then we would get Friday Night Fish'n'Chips from the shop near Canterbury Railway Station, and it was bliss!
Before I could read I remember my dad would occasionally on a Sunday night (the only day I ever saw him) read to we three kids stories from Knights of the Round Table. Then, around age 8, I remember reading The Blue Rabbit, a book about a boy who could time travel to a place called Paradise.
Mod
Initially, I was a reluctant reader, especially during high school when you had to read for a purpose and critically analyse the book. After school something happened. I discovered that books opened up other worlds and provided access to other minds. Now I'm addicted. I'm surrounded by books and I always have one with me.I got into writing because I needed to write instructional material to explain how things worked. Now I've moved over to creative writing because it's a lot of fun telling stories.
My mother taught me to read Dick and Jane books when I was four and I have been reading ever since. I can remember reading to my younger brothers and sisters and telling them all the little kid stories (The Three Bears was my favorite). I always give books for birthdays and Christmas. I gave my daughter
when her daughter (now 21) was born. She still reads it to her 5 year old, who just started Kindergarten this September. He is already reading.
I learned to read with the dick and Jane books. There was a Sally as well which I liked :)I also taught my children to read with them (along with the ladybird versions) I remember my oldest daughter crying because her teacher gave her a book with no words in it her first day at school (1984) I explained to the teacher that Mandy could read and she said that I had possible ruined Mandy by not teaching her the correct way!! Her sister arrived at the school 3 years later - already reading!! Now I am watching the two girls teach their children to read - yep you guessed it - before school!!
Mod
Sally906 wrote: "I learned to read with the dick and Jane books. There was a Sally as well which I liked :)I also taught my children to read with them (along with the ladybird versions) I remember my oldest daugh..."
I think we began with Dick and Dora at School. My Mum used to help cover the new reading books, so I used to read them all before we were given them at school... My poor teachers. There was a series about a cowboy that I remember loving once I'd got past Dick and Dora, Fluff and Nip :)
My Mum was a primary school teacher and had all the Janet & John and Dick & Dora primers at home so we learnt to read quite early, but she never pushed us. Both my parents also read to us - all the kids classics, Winnie the Pooh, Alice in Wonderland, Wind in the Willows, and fairytales. We also had ladybird and little golden books and then later Famous Five and Secret Seven. We also regularly went to the library as a family - something I did with my kids. My Dad travelled quite a bit for work and used to send me the most wonderful stories in letters that he wrote complete with illustrations. I wish I'd kept some of them.
I got given a gorgeous book in Prep for doing well with my reader. It included Heidi and Black Beauty and one other story which doesn't come to mind now. Suffice to say that 40 years later I still have that very first book and I'm still as passionate about reading.
One of the best things is if you have children is listening to them read! OMG...If parents would do this more so many children would benefit from it! Many don't see it as a need and expect the teachers and ta's to work miracles..And most children do learn from reading at school BUT if a teacher tells a parent it would be really handy if they listened to their kid for like 5 mins a night or even every second night it'd boost their child's confidence...Yet parents come up with excuses like you gotta believe :(
Laura wrote: "One of the best things is if you have children is listening to them read! OMG...If parents would do this more so many children would benefit from it! Many don't see it as a need and expect the teac..."I used to love listening my kids read every night once they were tucked up in bed and then I'd to read to them for a while. Even when they were older we read all the Harry Potter books together with them reading a few pages and then me reading a chapter. They loved it and I can't imagine parents not wanting to do it.
I can't remember starting to love reading, because I always did it - I was one of those kids that hung out in the library at lunch as a refuge. The first book I remember reading and adoring was The Stone Cage by Nicholas Stuart Grey - so much so that as an adult I tracked it down on the internet and bought myself a copy. There was a bushfire a few months later and when I thought I was going to be evacuated, I packed the PC and photo albums...and that book. <3
Aussie Readers
Books mentioned in this topic
The Stone Cage (other topics)Goodnight Moon (other topics)
The Magic Faraway Tree (other topics)
The Sam Pig Story Book (other topics)
The Water Babies (other topics)
More...
Authors mentioned in this topic
Enid Blyton (other topics)Kathryn Kenny (other topics)
Estelle Grey (other topics)
Roald Dahl (other topics)
Stephen King (other topics)
More...
Me too Brenda! I also loved the Trixie Belden series when I was a bit older