15 years ago,
I was a teaching artist in the New York City public schools,
and one of my projects was adapting and directing
a production of "Charlotte's Web"
with a group of third graders at PS 220,
the Mott Haven Village School in the South Bronx.
As a way to begin our work together,
I read aloud the first chapter from E. B. White's famous and beautiful book.
As some of us may recall,
the story begins with Fern learning that her father, Mr. Arable,
is off to the hoghouse to kill the runt of the litter with his axe.
(Reading) "Please don't kill it," she sobbed, "It's unfair."
Mr. Arable stopped walking.
"Fern," he said gently,
"you will have to learn to control yourself."
"Control myself?" yelled Fern;
"This is a matter of life and death, and you talk about controlling myself?"
Tears ran down her cheeks, and she took hold of the axe
and tried to pull it out of her father's hand.
(Reading ends)
Well, the pig is saved, and later that morning,
Fern discovers a carton on her chair at breakfast.
(Reading) As she approached her chair, the carton wobbled,
and there was a scratching noise.
Fern looked at her father, then she lifted the lid of the carton.
There, inside, looking up at her was the newborn pig.
It was a white one.
The morning light shone through its ears, turning them pink.
"He is yours," said Mr. Arable, "Saved from an untimely death.
And may the good Lord forgive me for this foolishness."
Fern couldn't take her eyes off the tiny pig.
"Oh!" she whispered, "Oh! Look at him!
He is absolutely perfect."
She closed the carton carefully,
for she kissed her father, then she kissed her mother,
then she opened the lid again,
lifted the pig out and held it against her cheek.
(Reading ends)
Well, when I finished reading the chapter, the kids lined up for lunch,
and a little boy named Joey tugged at my sleeve and he said,
"Miss B., I felt like I was right there.
Like, I could really see that little pig.
I never got inside a book before like that."
Well, I was thrilled that Joey was enjoying the story,
but, to be perfectly honest, at the time,
I was much more concerned with how in the world
we were going to make all those farm animal costumes
just using pillow cases,
and whether the kids would memorize all their lines or not.
They did. And we did.
And everytime I visited that classroom,
the kids couldn't wait for me to read aloud to them again.
For all the kids in the audience:
would you raise your hand if you really like it
when teachers read aloud to you or parents read aloud to you?
Or adults? Do you remember being read to? And loving it?
Well, I've been an educator for almost 20 years.
And I've read thousands and thousands of pages aloud.
And I've never met a group of kids who didn't love it,
who were immune to the spell of a great book being read aloud.
As a teacher and a mom, I can't think of many things
that matter as much as reading aloud to our kids.
At all ages. At school and at home.
Because reading aloud gives kids a special kind of access
to the transformative power of story,
and the experience of what real reading is all about,
which is to deeply understand,
to think, to learn and discuss big ideas about the world,
about the lives of others and about ourselves.
So, when I think back to what Joey said to me all those years ago,
"Miss B., I felt like I was right there. Like, I could really see that little pig.
I never got inside a book before like that."
I'm struck by this idea
that reading aloud for Joey
made it possible for him to get inside a book;
as though before that experience he was outside.
Because Joey is not alone in feeling that way.
Reading for a lot of kids can feel like a locked building.
Without the right key or the right code,
or the right experiences, they can't get in.
They feel like they're outside.
Because for some kids, dealing with the code,
the tangle of letters and sounds, tricky words and vocabulary,
is a more difficult process for any number of reasons.
The decoding of words takes up so much brain energy,
they don't have a lot of brain space left over
to actually take in the story or the meaning.
For other kids, the decoding isn't so difficult,
but it can sometimes feel like they're just translating words across a page,
like how I might do with a medical textbook or a medical journal.
I could translate or decode the words,
but I wouldn't be able to understand them, or think, or talk about them.
How many of us here have found ourselves halfway down a page only to realize,
"I have no idea what I just read."
(Laughter)
When teachers and parents read aloud, we do the decoding work.
We deal with the print and the tricky vocabulary and words,
and we free kids to think.
So they can use all their brain energy
to imagine the story and learn new information.
So all children listening have access
to the amazing reading party happening inside the building.
And we want kids to get in the building and get to the party and stay there.
Even while they're still strengthening their decoding or comprehension
or vocabulary muscles in books they can read on their own.
Because even when kids are reading on their own,
reading aloud to them has a tremendous impact
on their independent reading lives.
Because when kids go back to their own books,
they know that world should come alive in their brains as they read.
They know that real readers pause to wonder, think, ask questions.
They know that real readers let the stories affect them.
Maybe even change them.
Because the way that we stop and react at something that we read aloud
gives us an opportunity to model compassion,
to wonder aloud in a genuine way
about a choice a character or a community made.
When we read aloud, we can help kids walk in the shoes of people
who might be radically different from themselves.
Or see reflections of themselves,
which might make them feel less alone
or more hopefull.
What happens when we walk in the shoes of Kek,
a young refugee from Sudan who comes to Minessota
after seeing his brother and father killed in a war?
What can we learn from Auggie,
who was born with a rare facial anomaly?
Or Delphine,
who is eleven years old and goes to Oakland, California in 1968
to meet her mom for the first time, who is active in the Black Panther Party?
Or Annemarie,
who helps her best friend escape to Denmark
during The Holocaust?
We can give kids access
to stories, and books, and ideas, and information
that they otherwise might not get a chance to explore,
or explore as deeply.
And finally,
reading aloud gives us a chance to look up
from our screens, our phones, our computers;
to connect with each other
through the simple act of reading and talking together.
When we read aloud at school we're often gathered together in one place
and we're teaching kids how to talk together,
how to listen,
how to look each other in the eye and say: "What do you think?"
To say, "I think differently and here is why."
But we're also creating moments of connectedness and joy
in our classrooms, on a daily basis.
And at home,
it's a chance to carve out a time when we're not on our phones,
but we're entirely focused on our kids.
Or we pull up alongside them and read and talk together.
Even when they can't sit in our laps anymore.
Even and perhaps especially when they rather be on their phones.
Even when they're not three or four,
but they're eight, ten, twelve, a teenager
and they might not be as inclined to share so much with us anymore.
Having a book to lean on can help us get inside them.
In her new book, Reclaiming Conversation,
Sherry Turkle reminds us how esential face to face conversation is.
She says, "We're tempted to think that our little sips of online connection
add up to a big gulp of real conversation,
but they don't."
I believe that reading aloud together
provides an opportunity for a big gulp.
For a chance to connect and talk together, in consistent meaningful ways.
So the kids not only fall in love with books and reading,
and get better at it,
but they also learn to think deeply,
to consider other points of view.
They learn to listen and they learn to look up.
Thank you.
(Applause)