My love of reading

The Meaning of the Word Read to Me!

For years and years as a primary school teacher I taught the reading of two


languages to grade school children in my home country of Zimbabwe. My first


year of teaching I was only 18 years, old and I found myself with 50 curious


young children at my hands eager to learn under my competent guidance. I


enthusiastically introduced those children to the reading of both English and


Shona. After all there is a common bond between the English language and


Shona. The English alphabet has 26 letters and the Shona alphabet has only 22


letters. These consonants are the same except Shona does not have the letters l,


q, independent c, and x. The vowels are the same except they sound differently


particularly for a, e, and u. With English being Zimbabwe’s official language and


Shona being one of the indigenous languages and my mother tongue I had all the


drive to craft my children the ability to read. Let me characterize a little bit about


the languages of Zimbabwe. From the north of Zimbabwe the indigenous


language is mainly Shona a combination of Zezuru, Chinyika, Ndau, and Korekore


to the south is Ndebele a combination of Ndebele and Kalanga. The Ndebele


alphabet has x, l, and q but does not have an r. Though I was never taught


Ndebele I can read it fluently without much understanding what I am reading


because my Ndebele ability is limited.

During my years of teaching it was my passion to see those children I taught able to read and write and understand the written word. I wanted them to understand the written word and be able to transform the printed or written symbol into the spoken or acted form. I enjoyed seeing them participate in different world cultures because of what reading could grant them access to. It gave them access to a world beyond their geographical boundaries, beyond their ages, and beyond anything, they could have ever lived. Reading had opened that door to me once as a young child and I never looked back. As such early on in my teaching career I sought to understand my passionate emotions for reading, where they came from, why they were so deeply rooted in my teaching philosophy and my personality, how it came to be and why I so much enjoyed seeing my children able to acquire this exceptional skill. I believe for me to understand this phenomenon I had to understand what the word read meant and still means to me. According to the Webster’s dictionary to read is to -:

 A: look at carefully so as to understand the meaning of (something written or printed, etc)

B: utter aloud or render in speech (something written, printed, etc.) like reading a story to children; or the actor reading his lines in a booming voice.

C: have such knowledge of (a language) as to be able to understand things written in it; be it English, Shona, Nyanja, Ndebele, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, or Swahili.

As such to me reading became my personal tool that could open any doors to


things that I needed to know. Reading would make me know about the universe,


learn about history, understand the human body, know more about my country,


understand religion and its practices and many other current events. Reading


became my favorite pastime. The only sad thing was I never had enough books to


read then because the only place I could have access to books was school and


way back then we were never allowed to take the books home because we had


limited stocks.

I took this personal journey to find out when I was first introduced to the written word. If my memory saves me right I remember the first time anyone ever read to me was in Sunday school reading from the bible. The bible verse I recall up to this day which I was made to memorize and commit to memory was Luke 2 verse 40: The child Jesus grew. He became strong and wise and God blessed him. (Of course that was in Shona my mother tongue: Akakura Akasimba akazara nenjere nenyasha dzaMwari dzikava pamusoro pake). Then I remember some nights when my grandmother would read the bible to me. She would also take out her Anglican songbook and we would sing hymns of praise together. By the time I started school I had already developed love for reading. I think by this time I was only six years old and I had not started school. By the time I was introduced to my first school book it had colorful pictures and the printed work.

Even as I attended my first grade in school I remember most of what I read in school. It was as though everything would have been photographed to memory. I was taught about individual differences then, (I am me and you are you…Ini ndini, Iwe ndiwe) about family (father, mother, baby, sister), about community (you, us, we, they), about God, and the world around us. I would recite everything to my grandmother when I got home in the evenings because from the time I was 5 years old my father opted me to take care of his aging mother. I would help her keep the house clean, fetch water, firewood, and perform all the traditional female chores girls of my time and era performed. Prisca (not that we were ever allowed to call grandparents, parents, and for that matter any adults by name) my grandmother would let me just go off the top of my head reciting all the reading I would have participated in at school, because we were never allowed to bring books home so I made the best while in school. In school, I had the opportunity to look carefully at the printed symbol and the written word became alive to me. It spoke to me and I understood its language and what it said to me on a personal level. I was never shy to read aloud and as such that helped speed up my reading skills. Because the more frequent I was called upon to read the better I became.

I progressed diligently with my school work. I excelled in every grade and the most impressive things I remember were all the responsible hard working teachers who taught me in grade school and how they each contributed to my world. I know they were hard working because most of them taught two classes a day one from 8- 12 and another from 12-4. Who else but some hard working people could dedicate so much time to 6-10 year olds every day Monday through Friday? On top of that, the classes were huge I recall there would be not less than 50 pupils in each class. In fact, in my eyes it was not just a career but a special calling for them to dedicate so much of themselves to our education. Even today, I stand in reverence to those men and women who were responsible for my early education. Male teachers mostly taught me and they were wonderful. It was only in Standard Four that I was taught by a female teacher. It was then that my love for reading was further developed and entrenched in what became to be a life long love for reading. This teacher was a close friend to my eldest brother and I think they encouraged each other to broaden our reading horizons. I had a dependable advocate to this passion in the person of my eldest brother Rhoderick. Amazingly, I now know he was only in high school then and I think he understood what we stood to achieve through reading. The saddest part is he only lived to be 21 years old, as he died during our liberation war. Up to this very day I never cease to wonder what an impact he would have made to the world and his own child’s life had he lived even to be just thirty years old. I always hear of people speaking of their heroes. When it comes to my education and my reading prowess my brother Rhoderick was my hero.

When I was in Standard 4 my brother introduced me to the world of literature. He bought me books that I read over and over and over because I enjoyed and believed those stories so much that I thought my own world would be transformed just by reading the books over and over. Among the books he bought for me were Oliver Twist, Lorna Doone, Pride and Prejudice, Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn only to name a few. I enjoyed white Christmases where I would never have witnessed any but wet ones; I rode on the tram cars when all I had ridden on were the public buses. I read about the world war when my world then was simply trusting and innocent. I had my first book review in Standard Four and I remember the first big words (the jaw breakers as we called them then) in my vocabulary were arrested and released and my classmates were in awe of me and asking what the words meant. Even as I write now my chest swells up because of the pride and joy I felt then as it resurfaces to the top as though I am reliving everything. I enjoyed the attention it brought me. I found power in the written word. I participated in drama, fantasy, and fairy tales because of the doors that opened to me through reading. I read anything that my hands could grab hold of, comics, children’s story books, the bible, religious literature; nothing legible was safe from my prying eyes and curious mind. My mind was like a little sponge absorbing as much it could.

As a teenager, that passion for reading would land me in trouble with me lecturers, many times, than I can remember. I would escape into my reading world during boring class lessons consequently, I would lose track of time. I would become absorbed in my own world playing a role no matter what I read I always chose a role for me. I remember in one particular class and during that period reading a comic Murder is Sweet during the geography lesson period. The teacher called on me to answer a question and when he realized I had a book under my desk he came over and pulled it from my nervous fingers as he showed it to everyone. If there was anytime I was ever embarrassed for doing the wrong thing at the wrong time it was that day. He proceeded to the front of the class and held my comic showing it to the whole class as he imitated a sweet innocent voice, she thinks murder is sweet. Luckily my complexion does not blush I think I would have blushed to death…and poor me the floor did not even attempt to open up to swallow me and save me the humiliation.

After comics came the obsession to read love stories. I remember my first year training to be a teacher a classmate giving me a novel Brandy for Breakfast!  Do not even ask me who the author was all I know it was one of those books I enjoyed reading and it opened up another avenue of different literature to me altogether. Probably my first lessons in sex and drink. I would borrow school books from the library to read after lights went out under my covers with my flashlight. Every lunch hour instead of taking a siesta like my classmates, I spent my time in the library reading and pouring my eyes over any book I could get hold of. In all this I was a much-disciplined scholar as I never forgot to do my school assignments as long as there was reading involved I had no problem at all. I continued to excel. However, I never saw myself as excelling to the degree I did until one year as a second year student teacher I was called to receive an achievement price for overall achievement. That was the icing on my cake and motivated me to continue to read in unprecedented terms.

Now I look back to those first reading lessons and realize how far I have come. I have influenced kids to read a book a week and love reading in order to succeed in education. I have taught my own children to love reading and they have all become college graduates. I have staff developed teachers on different reading strategies and believe some of them still remember me for that. I have improved myself academically from the teacher certified student trained as an 18 year old to a seasoned doctorate graduate with national and international scholarship because of reading. So how can anyone succeed without reading?