RES 5535: Race, Class, and Gender in Literacy Research (summer 2010)

All About Meredith

Hello, my name is Meredith and I am currently teaching kindergarten in Catawba County, North Carolina. I have been a teacher for five years, two in kindergarten and three in first grade. I graduated from Appalachian State University in 2005 with a Bachelors Degree in Elementary Education. After teaching for 3 years, I decided to start the master’s program in reading. I love to read as well as teach children how to read. There is such a great feelings inside when a child picks up a book for the first time and begins to read; the feeling of pride and accomplishment takes over. With the completion of my graduate work in August, I plan to go on to get my Doctorate. I want to educate rising teachers how to teach reading to their students, because I feel I came into teaching with little knowledge of how to teach reading, and did not fully learn until I began the Master’s program.

Growing up I was read to daily by my sister, mom and dad. Each night before bed I remember having stories read to me, a lot of the time the same story. If whoever was reading to me skipped a part in the story I would let them know they were not reading it correctly. My parents strived to me the importance of reading and a good education. They wanted me to be the best person I could be and go as far as I could in life. As I grew up I loved to read, and then that love dwindled away when I went to college. I did not enjoy reading things that were not of interest to me; things I was told I had to read. Throughout college, I cannot recall reading one book for pleasure, because I was always bogged down with other assigned readings. After college I began reading again and really enjoyed picking up a good book, and getting lost for hours in it. I recall nights where I would be so caught up in the story I was reading that I would be jarred from it when my alarm would go off to start the next day. As I’ve grown as a teacher, I now enjoy reading books that help me to become a better teacher. I try to attend as many credited workshops to help bring new ideas into my classroom, and I strive to revamp my teachings as often as necessary to help each student.

Now that I am teaching, I try my best to read to my students as often as I can. I will reread one story over and over because the children love it and beg for it to be read to them again. When picking stories for my class I take into consideration what they want to read, and try to meet the interest levels of all my students. As a kindergarten teacher, a lot of my students came to me at the beginning of the year with little knowledge of books. This saddened me, and I have tried hard to get them to have a love for reading as I did when I began school.

I truly believe reading is the foundation of all things in life. You read to learn, explore, and enjoy, and if you cannot read you will truly be lost in life. I cannot teach everyone in the world to read or to even love to read, but I can do the best I can with the people I meet and teach. If I can get one child loving books, then I have changed that child’s life for the better.

Meredith Bromley