Children respond with wonder when listening to a favorite story. As an early childhood special educator, I have had the honor of reading stories to hundreds of kids. My claim to fame is that my students did not want to miss my story times.
One of my two year olds crawled under the table in her Speech Pathologist’s room and signed “teacher” over and over again. She only came out when the Pathologist promised to bring her back to her classroom. Turned out she did not want to miss story time. We laughed because the week before one of my four year olds refused to leave story time to go with her. The Pathologist decided to join my story times for the therapy sessions.
What is really fascinating is to have the child “read” the story to you. I have had a nonverbal child with autism, “read” me a story when she had absolutely no language. This child was often violent attacking herself, other children, and adults. This does not even include property destruction. She had very little eye contact. However, one day, this child using her breathe rate and sounds “read” me the story. She changed the tone, pitch, and rate of her sounds to match the story. It was incredible. She even looked into my eyes to make sure I was getting it! It was also the beginning of knowing that she and I could work together to improve her communication skills.
Storytime is a shared adventure with a child. It does not matter if you are a parent, grandparent, sibling, friend, or teacher. Treasure this special event as often as possible.