Another Thing About Reading

So, what do I have in common with two football players, a policeman, and a woman in pyjamas? We were all part of Family Literacy Day at Dr. J. Seaton School in Sheffield this week. Linda Fleming (in pyjamas like most of staff and students that day) organized the event at which two Hamilton Tiger Cats, a police constable, the school superintendent and I each read a story to a gym full of kids.

The superintendent (who had left for a meeting by the time pictures were taken) started with The Balloon Tree by Phoebe Gilman, a book that was a favourite of his three daughters when they were growing up.

I read from King of the Castle (by me!) about a school caretaker who is learning to read. Coincidentally, one of the books he’s pleased to be able to read before his story ends is another Phoebe Gilman title, Something from Nothing.

The police constable read Jeremiah Learns To Read by Jo Ellen Bogart, coincidentally inspired by the same man who inspired me to write King of the Castle.

The football player closed the morning with Too Many Books by Gilles Tibo. Of course the book lovers in the room knew there’s no such thing as too many books – except perhaps in the ‘so many books, so little time’ sense.

Why not make every day Family Literacy Day? Happy reading!

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Kathy Stinson is the author of the classic Red Is Best and the award-winning The Man with the Violin. Her wide range of titles includes picture books, non-fiction, young adult fiction, historical fiction, horror, biography, series books, and short stories. She has met with her readers in every province and territory of Canada, in the United States, Britain, Liberia, and Korea. She lives in a small town in Ontario.

Kathy Stinson

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