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Hi all! My name is Chris, I currently live in Amesbury, Massachusetts. I graduated from Allegheny College and am currently going after my Master of Education in Special Education and a certificate in ABA. I currently work as an ABAC at a specialized private school.

Its funny actually, growing up I read all the time and I loved Harry Potter books as most kids my age did. And read a lot of Matt Christopher books like many boys in my grade did. I found the process of reading easy and was always looking for challenges as I grew up. There are often still books my younger siblings read for school that I remember useless factoids from.

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Hi everyone!

My name is Lindsay Beise and I am from Mansfield, MA. I attended Northeastern for my undergraduate degree in psychology, and am currently in pursuit of my Master of Education in special education and applied behavior analysis. I currently work as a behavior therapist in an ABA program within a public elementary school.

Growing up, I loved to read! It came easily to me and I enjoyed reading by myself or having my parents read to me. I often tried to keep up with my older brother and read something that he was reading. I loved Harry Potter, and one of my fondest memories was having my parents read them aloud to me and my brother before bedtime! I also enjoyed the Junie B. Jones series, Babysitter’s club, and anything by Judy Blume.

Because reading came easily to me, it was something I enjoyed doing when I was younger (and still do!). I am very interested to learn more about the challenges that students may face when learning to read, and how to best overcome those obstacles to make reading as enjoyable for them as it was for me!

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Hey everyone! My name is Kayla Burke and I am from Yonkers, NY. I see this is a common occurrence in this class but I also just graduated from Endicott College with a degree in Physical Education. I am currently pursuing a Master's degree in Special Education Moderate Disabilities grades k-8. I'm really excited to get started in this next chapter (pun intended) and become a more well-rounded teacher.

Growing up I actually read a lot. I read all of the Harry Potter books early in my life as well as other well-known book series. My mom read to all of my siblings and I quite often when I was little. My grandmother was actually my babysitter for most of my childhood and she would take my cousins and I to the local library after school and we would stay their for hours.

All my life I really enjoyed reading but sometimes it would be difficult. I have a difficult time focusing and sitting still for long periods but if a book is really good and I am interested in it, I can sit for hours.

I have a passion for working with children with special needs as I have been doing it for most of my life. Along with working in a special needs pre-school with my mom since I was 16, I also have 2 siblings who have intellectual disabilities. I am really excited for this class as I can attest that there are so many benefits that come from reading as a child and young adult in the long run.

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Hi Everyone! My name is Julia Sullivan and I am from Burlington, MA. I, like some of you, have recently graduated from Endicott with for my undergraduate and couldn’t pass up the opportunity to come back for another year! I graduated with my bachelors in elementary education and I am excited to begin working on my masters for moderate disabilities.

Reading has always been a challenge for me because I find it difficult to sit still for a long period of time. I also find myself having to read the same page or article multiple times to comprehend the meaning.

Growing up I loved Dr. Seuss because they were whimsical and had simple plots. When I was in elementary school I enjoyed the books from the Junie B. Jones series or anything sports related, especially soccer. As I have grown up, I have realized that I should have been reading more throughout my years because I would have developed a stronger vocabulary and fluency. I am slowly developing my love for reading but I will get there eventually!

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Hello all! I’m Emily Felter and I’m from Newburyport, MA. I graduated from Endicott with my degree in Elementary Education and am perusing my moderate disabilities licensure through the Fellows Program. I will be at the Steward School in Topsfield and I hope to inspire my students to believe in their abilities and to learn about the world outside of their classroom walls.

Growing up I had a strong relationship with reading. At an early age I associated reading with comfort because my mom read to be before bed every night. I spent endless hours during the summer reading books. My mom created a sticker chart that encouraged my sister and I to read more in order to receive a prize. But, it wasn’t the sticker chart that kept me reading; I genuinely loved to dive into the world that reading created.

My favorite author was Beverly Cleary. I adored the Ramona books and read every one. I wrote a letter to Beverly Cleary when I was in 2nd grade and she wrote back! It was a typed up post card and it meant the world to me, as a little growing reader, that she took the time to answer.

As I got older, I recall a summer night in my middle school years when my best friend and I thought it would be “cool” and “impressive” to stay up all night and read. We vowed we wouldn’t sleep until we each read a book beginning to end. As expected, by midnight we both fell fast asleep. But, we got an A for effort!

As for most, during my high school and college years my reading habits declined. I still enjoyed reading but found it to be lower on my list of priorities. I still go through random spurts of reading for a month or so and then put it on pause for a short while. I hope that this summer I will find more time to enjoy reading as much as I did when I was younger. Additionally, once I start teaching, I hope to insight the same love of reading in my students that I felt when I was their age.

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Hi everyone! My name is Melissa and I am from Braintree, MA. I graduated from Bridgewater State and I am in the severe disabilities and ABA program here at Endicott. Currently, I work for a public school close to me, with grades 3-5 on the Autism Spectrum.

Reading is passion of mine and it started when I was younger, unless it was reading in front of the class (I get very shy)! Growing up I loved Agatha Christi and the Box car children. I would often read to my parents and little sister. I have continued to read and have since moved on to the classics and Russian Literature, since it is more challenging. I love the books Anna Karenina and The Alchemist!

Reading for me has always been easy, it was just hard trying to find books that were challenging, yet engaging.

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Hi! My name is Jami Malvarosa and I am from Peabody, MA. I graduated from Endicott and studied elementary education. I am excited to begin working on my masters for moderate disabilities.

My first memories of reading are when my mom would read to my sisters and I every night before we went to bed, which I always enjoyed. I also remember her taking us to the public library all the time to pick out new books and join in on events held at the library. I liked reading anything by Dr. Seuss or Shel Silverstein and loved the Junie B. Jones books. I also tried teaching my younger sisters how to read.

I always found the process of reading to be something that was easy and fun for me. I really enjoyed reading and spent a majority of my time reading in elementary and middle school. Reading became more of a chore for me in high school and college, but I am trying to regain my love for reading to be able to share that passion with my students.

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Hello all! My name is Katie Tanguay and I am from Windsor, CT. I graduated Assumption College with a degree in History and Secondary Education. I am excited to be doing my masters in Moderate Disabilities at Endicott and working at Marblehead High School next fall.

I loved reading as a child. My favorite books to read were the Harry Potter series and historical fiction, which inspired my love for history. One of my first reading memories was my mother reading the Harry Potter series to my older brother and me.
To me, reading to myself came very easily. But I had difficulties with reading in my classes. I was very shy in elementary school and I hated reading aloud because I always stumbled through the words. I remember usually getting placed in the lower reading groups because the teachers assumed that I wasn’t talking because I didn’t understand the material. It was my love of reading, however, that inspired me to start talking in class. I wanted to be just like Hermione, so I started raising my hand and talking more in class. I was always trying to challenge myself and read books above my grade level and was very proud when I tested at an 11th grade reading level in 6th grade and was put in a special reading class.

In high school I started reading a lot less. Like most of us, I had to read a lot of books for my English classes, so I didn’t have the motivation to read outside of class.  While I did enjoy some of the books we read in high school (Catcher in the Rye was my favorite), most of the books I did not enjoy reading. Reading became more about memorizing character’s names and finding quotes to fulfill essay requirements than actually reading the book.

I didn’t really start reading again until I took a Children’s Literature course my junior year, where I reread a bunch of my favorite books from childhood. These books reminded me how much I loved to read as a kid, and made me realize that I missed reading. Since then I started reading for pleasure again.

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Hi everyone, my name is Tyler Schermerhorn and I am from Lowell, MA. I just graduated from Endicott with a degree in English and a license in Secondary Education. I am looking forward to completing my Masters program for moderate disabilities and working at Manchester Essex Regional Middle School in the fall.

I've always enjoyed reading, and still continue to read for fun in my spare time. One of my first memories with reading was in 2nd grade, when i was placed in one of the top reading groups. We would be pulled from class and work with one of the 2nd grade teachers, and we would have to read in front of the group and be graded on our fluency and pronunciation. I remember i pronounced the word "hinder" wrong and was removed from the group the following day. I think this event is what made me want to get better at reading, and sparked my interest in getting better. My favorite book growing up was always Maniac Magee, and now it's a book called Let the Great World Spin. I never particularly enjoyed being read to, so my favorite person to read with was myself, alone in my room or outside on a nice day. After second grade, I never had too much trouble with reading. Of course there were words i came across I had never seen or did not know and struggled with those, but after some practice I would get them. Also, I remember taking those Lexicon tests on the computer in elementary and middle school, and I always scored relatively high on them. I think the growing success due to my practice with reading always made me enjoy it, and it's something I continue to enjoy to this day.

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Hi Everyone!

My name is Amelia Arbeely and I am from Wilmington, Ma. I just graduated from Endicott with a degree in elementary education and now I’m part of the Fellowship program for my Masters. I am so excited to be working in Beverly again in the fall!

I have really great memories of reading books as far back as I can remember. I loved reading with parents every night and Dr. Seuss was definitely one of my favorites. Before I could read I would have my parents read the same book every night, Old Hat New Hat, until I had it memorized and I thought I could read. I was a little slow to completely learn all the skills to read, I remember being in one of the lower reading groups in first grade. Even though I wasn’t the fastest reader I really enjoyed reading. Through elementary school and middle school I loved to read. Somewhere in high school I stopped reading so much as I became busier I lost the drive to read as much and I have been trying to get back into it.

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Hi everybody, my name is Savanah Greiner.  I'm from Farmington, CT and just graduated from Endicott with a degree in early childhood education.
I have really great memories of reading from a young age. My first memory is probably listening to my dad read to my brother and I before bed, our favorite series was The Chronicles of Narnia which we read through three times. My favorite books were probably Junie B. Jones and the Magic Tree house series. I loved to read with my parents as it was something we did regularly often every day. I absolutely loved reading growing up and was an avid reader up until the end of high school when I began to have more school work and began working. I was lucky to fid the process of reading easy so it was a bug hobby of mine for the majority of my life and I still really enjoy reading a good book.

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Getting to know you: Ashley Buraczynski 

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Getting to know you: Ashley Buraczynski 

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Hi! My name is Ashley Buraczynski.  I am from Littleton, MA and recently graduated from Endicott as part of the class of 2018! My major as an undergraduate was Ed. Studies and I am now pursuing my Masters in Special Education Moderate Disabilities. I am excited to be working in Newburyport in the fall!

Some of my best childhood memories are reading books.  As a child, my parents always read books to my brothers and I.  I especially loved being read to before bedtime or during lunch.  I have vivid memories of reading some of my favorite books over and over, such as, The Very Hungry Caterpillar, The Giving Tree, Corduroy, my favorite chapter book series, Junie B. Jones, and the list goes on… Although I loved reading at home with my family members, when it came time to read in school I did not enjoy it at all.  In second grade I struggled with reading and began going to reading class, up until around 6th grade.  Because I always felt that reading was not a strength of mine, I began to dislike it all together.  I read slower than my classmates and I struggled to sound out long words.  I remember dreading reading aloud to the class or being chosen during “popcorn” reading.

Although I never grew to love reading the way I did when I was a young child, I do feel that I have become a more fluent reader and don’t struggle nearly as much to comprehend the text.  I hope this class gives me insight on the many difficulties children may face when learning to read and the most effective methods of helping them overcome challenges so that they can enjoy reading as they become older.

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Hello everyone,
My name is Shauna Murphy and I'm from Framingham, MA! I am very excited to be starting my masters in Moderate Disabilities and ABA, and look forward to all of our future discussions! As I grew up, I never truly enjoyed reading. Throughout my childhood, I remember reading with my mom a lot, and even joining book clubs with her, but never truly enjoying the act of reading. As a child, and even now, I would much rather listen to a story rather than read it myself. I have always found it easier to understand information by listening, rather than reading it on my own. I think this is because I tend to read at a slower pace, which slows down my comprehension and causes me to have to reread. Though the reading process was difficult for me, I am excited to be taking this course and learn new techniques to help my students have an easier time with reading.

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Hi everyone, my name is Alyssa Baigelman.  I am excited to start this class! I am finishing up my degree in Severe Disabilities and ABA.

Reading would not be listed at the top of my hobby list. I struggled with reading and writing during elementary school through Middle School. I needed extra help to strengthen these skills. At that time I was embarrassed that it some of did not click and even today I don't like reading out-loud, I always read the passage before I am called on so I don't stumble on words.

During high school, I started reading books for "fun". There were a few books that kept my interest but once I got to college, I found myself reading less.

When I started working at my job which I am 1:1 ABA therapist at a private school, I find myself reading many books. One of my student also made me realize how much I loved "Amelia Bedelia" when I was younger. My mom would read these series all the time because it would help me understand sarcasm. I loved reading with my mom and I love reading with my students. You can learn many things from books that are very relevant to the students life.

Now that I am back in school, I enjoy reading books or articles that have to do with my field. I read many books written by adults with Autism. I also enjoy reading articles about applied behavior analysis. So reading has become easier if I am passionate about it but if I am not, its extremely difficult but I am always working on making it easier!

I think taking this class will help make sure I can create a environment where reading is fun! I have also struggled with reading myself so I can put myself in my students shoes and find strategies for them to become a strong reader. I would love to have my students become passionate about reading and do it in their free time.

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Hi everyone! My name is Allison Regan but everyone calls me Ali! I am excited to start this new chapter in my life with all of you and hope to get to know you all a little more!

Reading was not my favorite thing to do while growing up. In the past when someone asked me if I liked reading I usually responded with a "no". It wasn't something I enjoyed doing during my free time, it always felt like a chore to me. For example, my mom would always have to force me to do summer reading or do my "30 minutes of reading" each night for homework and I usually lied and pretended to complete it.  Learning how to read wasn't the hard part for me, the hard part was finding a book I actually enjoyed and would stick with from beginning to end.

As I got older, I gradually began to enjoy reading more and more because my teachers taught me how to properly find a good book. I usually found myself choosing a book based off the look of the cover and not what the content was actually about. I discovered that reading can be enjoyable once I picked a story that related to who I am, my experiences and interests. It wasn't until 5th grade when my class read Tuck Everlasting by Natalie Babbitt that my eyes were truly opened to the wonderful world of reading.

Today, I find myself appreciating books much more and still continue to discover what interests me as a reader. I hope I can show my future students that reading can be enjoyable by using what I have learned from my past experiences. I hope to instill a passion for reading in my future students that I lacked for very long time!

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Hi everyone, my name is Ian Morris. I'm one of the few outliers in here as I attended Villanova for my undergraduate degree in economics. I'm very excited to be continuing my education at Endicott and look forward to getting smarter with all of you!

I tend to read and write at a slower, calculated pace so as to avoid the need to go back and reread or edit material.  Growing up, my slow pace led to a lot of frustration, especially when teachers assigned copious amounts of reading in a short window of time. Additionally, my youthful attention span prevented me from remaining engaged in many of the assigned readings for more than a few chapters. While many enjoyed the likes of Charlotte’s Web, To Kill a Mockingbird, and others mentioned by my fellow students, short stories have always been more my style. Aesop’s Fables are some of the first stories I remember reading with my mother. I also particularly enjoy the short works of Flannery O’Conner, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Herman Melville. The clever morals at the end of each tale always humored me and kept the reading fun. Some of the more recent books I’ve enjoyed include The Stranger in the Woods by Michael Finkel (I’m originally from Maine and this story about the North Pond Hermit is incredible) and When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi.

While the process of learning to read was not very difficult for me, there was a bit of a learning curve to absorbing and processing the material I was reading. It’s one thing to simply read what’s written on the page, it’s another thing entirely to understand and interpret it. I look forward to tackling these potential challenges with my students in the upcoming year and hope to help them recognize the pleasure in reading.

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Hi Everyone! My name is Danielle Small. I am excited to start this class with everyone!
To be honest, I am not a super fan of reading books.  I definitely prefer articles about the field I work in (applied behavior analysis). I love reading more "concrete" articles about studies and research and then thinking of how I can apply them to the kiddos I work with. I also enjoy reading about autism "success stories." One of my favorite books recently is called "The Reason I Jump." It is written from the perspective of a child with autism. It explains the reasons why the child engaged in certain behaviors, stereotypic of autism spectrum disorders. As you can see, I work with and am passionate about autism/applied behavior analysis/behavior.
I definitely read a lot when I was younger, I have specific memories of reading "Junie B. Jones." Currently, I work with kiddos with autism at a specialized school in Massachusetts. We read with the students often however I don't get the opportunity to teach much reading as my kiddos have a lot of other skills we are working on.
I am excited to take this course and modify and apply it to my students!

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Hi everyone! My name is Olivia and I am super excited for this next chapter with all of you. I have always loved reading and writing since I was little. Up until 2nd grade I had taken a speech class to help my reading and ever since then it has been a special part of who I am. Once I no longer needed my speech/reading class, I began to challenge myself in school and so didn't my teachers. I remember I was always worried I wouldn't be a great reader until I had my 3rd grade teacher that pushed me to do the best I could. She had me read more advanced books in my class, which at the time was "Charlotte's Web". Going forward with my schooling I then was able to take honors English courses and eventually came to the realization that teaching English and helping students like myself with their reading and writing is what I wanted to do! My all time favorite books were anything from "The Magic Treehouse" collections which I read with my speech teacher in elementary school and also "The Great Gatsby" by F. Scott Fitzgerald, which I read in high school. My favorite people to read with were always my mom and dad. They always provided me with the best books and support that I needed while I was learning how to read. Reading was always something I enjoyed to do and I still enjoy it to this day. I am looking forward to bringing positive energy to my 5th graders this coming school year and hope to not only make an impact on them by showing my appreciation for reading, but also help them gain confidence and find their own passion for reading as well.

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Hello all! I have always been a bookworm. I don’t recall who read with me as a child or how I learned to read, but I had opportunities early in my education that helped foster the strong reader I became. My teachers always challenged me as a reader and in turn I took on that challenge. I truly remember falling in love with reading when in the second grade my teacher introduced me to The Babysitters Club series. Not the most age appropriate topics for me to be reading at the time, but it was something that challenged me and kept me reading one book after another. By the time I was in fifth grade I was reading anything I could! I would always ask my parents to go to the library and stock up on as many books as I could carry. This obsession with diving into a different world as much as I could came to an end when undergrad began. My world shifted away from me having my head constantly in novels. However, to this day once I get my hands on a book I can’t put it down till it is finished. I have had many sleepless nights not being able to put a book down till I know the ending. I can’t pinpoint a favorite book but, I know many of my peers will agree, the Harry Potter series truly captivated me and are some of my favorite books today. I look forward to, hopefully continuing, fostering a love of reading in my 5th graders this upcoming school year and introduce them to stories I have read and loved. I hope to impact every student who walks through my classroom door and help them appreciate all types of stories.

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Hello friends! My name is Caroline and I’m super excited for this journey to begin!! Reading and I have a nice love hate relationship. I have never been someone who really reads for pleasure. Then when I came to college, I rekindled my love of reading. My first memories of reading consist of me trying to ready books like “Miss. Spider’s Tea Party” or “Ms. Nelson is Missing”. My favorite person to read with was probably my mom or my dad. They usually read to me every night. I wasn’t an avid reader growing up. My earliest memory with reading in the classroom consists of me working with a reading specialist. I would always get frustrated because my friends would finish reading before me, while I was pages behind. With the help of my teacher and the reading specialist we discovered that I was reading fine, just the speed at which I read was slower than my classmates. During the reading stations and workshops my peers would finish quickly, my teacher would end the reading time but I wouldn’t be done. This was why my comprehension was poor at the time. Once I hit middle school I disliked reading for school. The books we had to read weren’t books I enjoyed but I was forced to read them which made me dislike them more. During high school we read books that I enjoyed again like the Great Gatsby, Romeo and Juliet, and To Kill a Mockingbird. I hope to my bring my knowledge and understanding of reading to my classroom and that I can help my students discover their passion for reading.

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Hello everyone! My name is Lacey and I am very excited to get to know all of you. My love for reading started at a very young age.  My mother would take me on trips to the library and let me pick out any book that interested me at the time. Also, once a week a mobile library service would drive to my grandmother’s neighborhood and we would pick out books together.  After I picked out a book, I would take turns reading it with my grandmother outside on the porch.  My favorite books to read in Elementary School were written by Roald Dahl and Beverly Cleary.  It was hard for me to pick a favorite.  As I began Middle School, my love for reading was put on hold.  During this time of my life I began to take on more after school activities and never had the time to read, unless I had to read for a class.  In High School I began to discover my passion for reading that I remembered having growing up.  My friends and I created a bookclub and decided to read many of the popular series that had surfaced and even some personal favorites of our own.  My favorite book we had read together was The Fault in Our Stars and is still my favorite book today. It is hard to find time to read in my life now but it is something I would love to start again.  Reading was a major part of my life growing up and helped me create a lot of great memories I have with my grandmother.  Reading has also always been a positive experience for me and I would love pass on this positivity and passion for reading to my students!

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Hi everyone! My name is Lauren and I am excited to meet new faces and see old ones from undergrad! My love for reading has been inconsistent throughout my schooling. I loved to read when I was in elementary school. Learning to read was not that challenging for me and I remember being able to read independently pretty early on. I unfortunately grew out of my love for reading when I hit middle school. I think that this is a common trend for most students. I started to dislike reading because it was forced. Once I hit high school my love for reading returned when we had to read The Great Gatsby, one of my favorite books, freshman year. I find it hard to read books consistently and frequently when I have school work to do, but it is still something I love. I am excited to bring my love of reading to my students, and to ease the struggle that learning to read can be on a student.

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Hi everyone! It's nice to meet you, my name is Bethany. My love for reading has definitely been inconsistent throughout the years. I loved reading growing up and was super proud when I was a fluent Dr.Seuss and early picture book reader before elementary school. In first grade it started to become more intimidating because one student started reading Harry Potter independently and I didn't have the interest or stamina to read a book that size. Second grade, I knew I was placed in the lower reading group and my interest to read just kept getting lower and lower. I would do the reading for school, I just knew I was slower than a lot of my classmates. In elementary school, I also had trouble comprehending everything I read. By late middle and early high school, I began to enjoy reading more and more after choosing summer reading books that I really enjoyed. By high school, I started to no longer think about my pace all of the time and more so on comprehending and finding connections in the text. To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee became my favorite book. In college I double majored in English because of how much I like writing and class discussions and that helped me to develop an even greater confidence in reading than I had going into the major.

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Hello all, here we are again! My name is Eliza and I am excited to be a part of this program. I had a unique
introduction to reading as I was homeschooled until 7th grade. I was a very frustrated early reader and I distinctly remember hating  doing the phonics pyramids with my mom who was my teacher. I would say it took me until 3rd grade to really not hate reading and after I made it over the initial hump that was Henry and Mudge I blossomed into an avid reader. I even found myself enjoying summer reading. To this day reading is something I do readily, I am huge fan of fantasy and Victorian literature and loved every moment as an English major in literature classes. I am excited to tackle reading with high school students and learn more strategies to engage with them and make reading a text enjoyable and worth while. Reading has opened many doors for me, I believe it has connected me with the world and given space to interact with other people regarding a variety of ideas and points of view. I hope to bring my love reading into my classroom and use it to positively
impact and prepare my students for their future.