“Today a Reader, Tomorrow a Leader”- Margaret Fuller, American writer, journalist and literary critic once said, emphasizing that reading is really fundamental. Reading can build tomorrow’s leader if today we would start to build a nation, a community, and a school of readers. As what Charles William Eliot, an American Educator said “Books are the quietest and most constant of friends; they are the most accessible and wisest of counselors, and the most patient of teachers.” So let’s start reading!
A child's reading skills are important to their success in school and work. Reading a book is in itself an exercise to sharpen one's creative thinking skills, while it broadens their horizons. In addition, reading can be a fun and imaginative activity for children, which opens doors to all kinds of new worlds for them. Through reading, one exposed himself to new things, new information, new ways to solve a problem, and new ways to achieve one thing. Exploration begins from reading and understanding.
Reading connects a person with the world. As we all know that reading is very important to each individual, Reading is the foundation of learning. It is the basic tool that will enable the child to recognize printed symbols, letters or words and assimilate them with their concrete meaning. The abilities to read and comprehend are both essential. A child who can read but cannot understand what he reads is definitely considered NOT a Total Reader. Reading with comprehension leads every learner to interact to his environment.
Every child must develop a genuine interest and love for reading. The foundation of learning how to read begins in the home where the parents are the first teachers of their children. The knowledge they achieved in reading is a form of informal education. When they enter school, the great responsibilities to develop their reading skills and abilities depend on the hands of the teachers.
In any cultured society, where most places, establishments and entities are designed for educated people, it is really hard to get through the day without reading. In every step that an individual takes, the ability to read is indeed a necessity. Let’s say for instance in a daily basis at home, one must know how to read like medicines labels and instructions, condiments, appliances instructions and combustible or poisonous solutions for safety measures. That’s why reading as early as pre-school or first grade is expected to learn starting from perceiving the shapes of individual letters of the alphabet, phonemic awareness, the arrangement of each letter into words, the arrangement of words into groups and interpreting their meanings to achieve comprehension of what they have read.
With the advancement of technology in this millennial era, various reading strategies and techniques as well as reading materials have been innovated. No matter what way of reading skills we may opt to everyone should build this habit of reading and devote at least 30 minutes daily. By doing so, they will gradually build up a habit of reading and start enjoying it.