Charlie's "read in"

Charlie came home from school one day and said, "Guess what mom? Mrs. Miller said if I read for 20 minutes every night that we can have a party at the end of the month and invite whoever we want to come and read with us. And, I know exactly who I want to invite...Ruby."

The morning of, I had a conflict and told Charlie I wasn't sure if we'd be able to make it. So, his whole face lit up when we walked into his classroom. The students served hot chocolate and candy canes to their special guests and then people found a place on the floor to curl up and read together. It was a lot of fun.

Reading has really moved up on the priority list for Charlie this year. I was impressed with how responsible he was about keeping track of his minutes each night and could tell how happy he was to return it to his teacher.

He'd add up his minutes, happily report the results, and then say, "So and so read for 1000 minutes this month..." I asked him if hearing how much his classmates were reading had motivated him to read as well. He said, "No. The reason I've started reading so much is because my teacher said we could have a party if we did."

It's amazing what the word "party" can trigger in kids. Thank you Mrs. Miller for all your reading parties.