Bookmarks

I have been reading a lot of books this summer. I take recommendations from friends, teachers, and from awarding winning book websites, such as William Allen White, Caldecott and Newbury Award sites. The American Library Association (www.ala.org) also as a list of the most popular books for young adults. I don't read all the books on the list because after reading the summaries of some of the books I lose all interest in reading the complete book. Most of the books I have been reading on written at the 4th or 5th grade reading level with short chapters (my personal favorite thing about most of these books!).

Even though I would love to be able to purchase some of these books, that is not a possibility right now, so I settle for checking them out from the library. The fun thing about doing that is that I get a glimpse of the person who checked out the book before me. The bookmark in itself isn't as interesting as where they left it in the book. Most of the time when I see where they left it, I think to myself, "I hope they didn't stop reading here!" In the words of Journey, "Don't stop, reading....." pretty sure those are the words.

Any book that helps a child to form a habit of reading, to make reading on of his deep and continuing needs, is good for him.

~ Mary Angelou