Students, Parents, Teachers: Share Your Joy of Reading

Whether you've got Good Night Moon, Twilight, or Kindle on your nightstand, we want to hear from you about your love of reading. Post your comments below. Here's what your 2011 PARP Co-Chairs had to share:

Stephanie C. Impellittiere, Principal: As a little girl, I loved when my Dad read to me. I can't recall any specific titles or authors, but I loved to listen to his voice as he read many stories to me. A vivid childhood memory was when we would go to the library together and he would pick out books about history, whether it was world history, historical stories about the United States, or something else. It didn't matter; this was our time together and to this day my love for history is still with me. It's exciting to learn about historical facts and significant events that have shaped our world. But more interesting and more important is understanding the human faces that tie historical events together. This has always fascinated me, thanks to my Dad and our reading time together.

Ian Berger, Middle School Language Arts teacher: One of the secrets of being a good reader is to read because you want to. Forget all that stuff about "reading for success" or "reading to do well in school." The best reason to read is because you want to. What's the secret to wanting to read? It's all in your choice of book. Just pick books that interest you. I can guarantee that no matter what you're interested in, be it beetles, boats, ballet, or Benjamin Franklin, there are dozens of books on every subject waiting for you to open. If you're a lover of stories, the world of novels awaits you. So I challenge you to go out there, peruse your local library or bookstore or the lists of Amazon. Somewhere on those (sometimes virtual) shelves, you'll find a book that's right for you. Then, once you get your paws on a book that you love, cherish it and read it. When done with it, do yourself a favor: read it again.

Chip Rowe, GUFS parent: I started out making my own books in school and got consumed by a number of series, such as Encyclopedia Brown and the Chronicles of Narnia. I also liked Ed Emberley's How to Draw Animals. I remember sitting in my beanbag chair (!) reading for hours. Now I'm a writer, and I love non-fiction, especially books about history, science, and language. I have used the Internet to track down copies of my favorite childhood books online, such as Potawatomie Indian Summer, to read with my children, though I think they like to discover favorites of their own.

Charlotte Rowe, GUFS parent: In elementary school, I was so proud that I read all the books in the Nancy Drew mystery series and all the ones by Laura Ingalls Wilder and Louisa May Alcott. My fourth-grade teacher read chapter books to the class. One day she read about a character who started her own newspaper. That story inspired me to create a summer newspaper for my neighborhood friends, leading me to pursue journalism. It's still a Sunday event in our house to get cozy somewhere with the paper and a cup of coffee. We read books every night with our younger children and our third grader reads to herself, picking new stories off my freshly painted childhood bookshelf.