Monday, July 9, 2012

Turn the Page

Jude has a new favorite activity--turning pages. Jeffrey says Jude's the living embodiment of the Bob Segar song "Turn the Page" that Metallica later covered. (Leave it to my husband to make rock and roll nerdy. Oh well, at least Jeffrey didn't work in a Rush reference. He is getting better. :)) Sometimes, Jude even turns the page right on cue! Apparently, we read "Goodnight Moon," "Brown Bear, Brown Bear What Do You See," "Cat," and "Hop on Pop" a lot because he follows along looking from one page to the other and turns the page without me having to instruct him to do so. However, with other books, he'll turn the pages well before I've finished reading, or I'll have to say "Turn the page" at the appropriate time. Regardless, it's perhaps THE cutest thing I've ever seen. Yes, I say that about everything he does, but this is seriously adorable. This new marvel in Jude's life makes this English professor quite proud!I have to say, Jude has come a long way from just a few months ago when he preferred to chew the books. He had me worried there for a time. I have hoped Jude would like reading as much as I do. I really hope he uses his time better than I do and sets aside time to read every day. (I guess I do read every day, but not always for pleasure--the downside of teaching college English.) Of course, at thirteen months, he has no clue about the importance of reading; all he knows is, "When I turn a page, I see something entirely different. Cool!" Sometimes, he'll even go back and forth between pages as if to make sure that other picture is still there. Anyway, since we brought Jude home thirteen months ago, we have not had a day where we didn't read something to him. Heck, we started on some "light" Faulkner when he turned a week old! Admittedly, when in his more passive days, I would read aloud student essays to him and revel in my supermomdom. Believe me, I'm no multi-tasker, so the fact that I could grade papers and bond with my child at the same time made me feel like I really could do it all. However, as Jude grew more mobile and attentive, students' writing proved less and less interesting to him, and I certainly can't blame him there! I always appreciate when people get Jude books, though. He seems to love them, and every single book gets put to good use at our house. I try to introduce a different book per week just to expose him to new stories, pictures, and whatnot. Plus, each book presents to him a new challenge of when to turn the page! I don't know what I will do in the upcoming school year when I have grading overload to bring home with me--just slap some C's down for all of 'em, maybe? I'll worry about that when the time comes. What I do know is that I will spend every day, school in session or not, reading to Jude and giving him that opportunity to explore the world as only books can do. I will not, however, give society another reason to think that a Mississippi boy cannot read!

1 comment:

Sarah @ Vol Family Life said...

Yes! Good for you (although, I never would have expected less from you!) Evie loves to "read" too, and her favorite part is turning the pages. She often will go pick up a book for me to read to her. Her favorite is DOG. She LOVES it!