Good Old Lunch Time

I had an epiphany today. My lunch hour is to me in the here and now just the same as recess was to me when I was in grammar school. I have not changed a bit in 44 years!

I don't remember being a very enthusiastic student. I loved Literature, Art, History....the rest....I either wasn't interested in at all or I hated it...as in MATH! Yuck!

I was never a fan of grammar. And I know it shows. I know I make all kinds of grammatical mistakes. I have a friend who took a college grammar course. Hearing her talk about the stuff they talked about in that class made me (almost) wish I could take it. Now, at my ripe old ungrammatical age, I really wish I knew the rules.

The teaching method my elementary school used to teach reading was the Look & Say method.

Method 2:

With the 'look and say' method children learn to recognize whole words or sentences rather than individual sounds. Your student will look at a word which you sound, and in turn will repeat the sound (the word). Flashcards with individual words written on them are used for this method often accompanied with a related picture.

If you don't use a picture with the word the child will probably make a wild guess as to what it says trying to remember what sound you made previously. This is not a good method if you don't include pictures.

It is also recommended with this method to use whole short sentences rather than individual words. Write a short sentence representing the picture displayed. Say the sentence and ask the child to repeat it while pointing and looking at each individual word as he/she repeats what you said.

By making word cards you can create different sentences again and again. You can use each word card first to learn individual words and then laying the word cards together to form a sentence. You may need to make several word cards using the same word; e.g. the - and in order to form proper sentences.

In my humble (not really) opinion this is the CRAPPIEST method every devised by pedagogy!

This reader is typical of the ones I was taught from.

Guess Who
Scott, Foresman and Company
Copyright, 1951

Check out the scintillating vocabulary.


What child would not learn to love to read after being exposed to this?

Even so, I do remember Dick, Jane, Sally and Spot with affection. It must be those rose-colored glasses I must use to read now!


Somewhere around the 3rd or 4th grade I began to love to read. I was unstoppable. When I was 10 I was allowed to walk to the neighborhood library alone. I was in heaven! I could go whenever I ran out of books. (those stingy librarians would only allow you to check out something like 3 books...what was up with that? I wanted to take home a whole stack.) No one imposed a reading regime on me, but neither did anyone guide my choices. Once grown I realized there was a whole world of literature that I had missed out on.

Ever since those days reading has been my #1 hobby/safe haven/friend. Until my divorce. My chemical make-up became topsy-turvy. Add to that the fact that somewhere during this time menopause began and I lost my mind (concentration) for good. I still have problems sticking with and finishing a book today. But I have discovered that I can listen to a book on CD and I don't have the same concentration issues. My drive to and from work is 30 to 45 minutes each way so I get quite a bit of reading done.

I began this post writing about recess/lunch hour and it has become something altogether different. So I'll end where I began...lunch.

I have been salivating for a Greek salad with a particular local restaurant's ranch dressing for days. Today, I splurged. It was yummy.