Periodically, friends/coworkers/etc find out that I was considered “advanced” in reading when I was a child (I work for a literacy organization, so one’s reading habits tend to be a popular conversation topic).
I started reading at what I think is a normal age (four or five), but went through the “picture-book stage” at probably a faster than normal rate. I know that I finished off the whole “Little House on the Prairie” and “Chronicles of Narnia” series while I was seven years old. In second and third grade, I was given a higher-level reader so I could sit at my desk and complete questions on my own while the rest of the class sat in reading groups.
So my question is, is this really that advanced? To me, it feels normal because I’ve always been this way, but people always act slightly awed when they find out about this kind of thing. What does an “average” seven-year-old read?
My little brother is also an advanced reader.
I know this because in sixth grade he wanted to and did read the Illiad and Oddessey outside of class for fun.
I realize he wasn’t seven, but close enough.
I, however, am fairly sure I just misspelled one of those.
Well, I wouldn’t call that abnormal, but then I had truly weird reading habits as a child. By the time I was eight or nine, I had read:
– All my parents’ books on parenting (I wanted to find out what they were up to)
– Just about everything I could find about health and the human body – I wanted to be a doctor for a while – with the exception of a book called What About VD, which my parents wouldn’t let me check out of the library. (Since I didn’t know what VD was, I was completely mystified by this.)
– Lots of books about animals, but not just ones intended for children; Gorillas in the Mist was a particular favorite of mine, even though it was heavy going at times, as were the James Herriot books.
– Parts of The Scarlet Letter (I didn’t really understand it, but I liked Pearl)
– A true-crime story about a woman who poisoned several relatives with arsenic (I found this at a beach house where we stayed when I was eight; needless to say, I was VERY careful to hide it from my parents.)
So I’d say you were pretty normal by comparison – in fact, my mom used to BEG me to read proper children’s books if I was going to be out in public, and I’m sure she would have been quite happy with either Laura Ingalls Wilder or the Narnia books.
Don’t worry, Porpentine—I used to read the women’s magazines my mom left lying around and came barging in when she had a friend over, demanding to know what pubic hair was!
I also seem to recall reading a really trashy mystery when I was a child that involved necrophilia (there was some kind of plotline involving Druids, which is why I checked it out of the library in the first place). James Herriot was also a favorite!
I was reading at an early age, too (4 years old). My kindergarden teacher would have me read to the class while she got craft projects ready for us.
In first grade I was sent to the third grade class’s reading group because I was so bored.
Went through the Little House stuff in second grade. When I was 9, I discovered the adult section of the library. Since I wasn’t allowed to check out books from that section, I’d sneak a book back to the children’s section and read it. By the time I was eleven, I’d read Sidney Sheldon’s The Other Side of Midnight, Judy Blume’s Forever and Peter Benchley’s Jaws, just to name a few.
My mom never knew about that stuff, though. And when she became born again, she started banning almost everything I read anyway, and I did a lot of reading on the sly at bookstores, school and the library. She even through out books of mine if she found them in my room.
Sorry. Not sure what all that has to do with the OP.
Or, I was just really, really, really, really, really (you get the idea), slow.
No. I think the point is that I was lazy and would rather just watch TV all day, which was fine with my parents, and why I’m not going to let my child do that, yada-yada-yada. Or, when bored of TV, I played outside.
Anyhoo, to the OP, yes, you were quite advanced. No, that’s not usual, at least in my experience.
i don’t think it’s unusual at all. but then again, i learned to read at age 3. so did my brother.
what is the secret? what is this stunning method used that is so fantabulous? or a method that just happened to work on us, at least. heh :D. my mom read to us. a lot. she would sit next to us or have us in her lap and when she read, she’d run her finger underneath each word as she said it. we’d watch her finger and our brains made the connections. if i ever have kids, i’m doing that, too.
i was reading beverly cleary books (beezus and ramona, henry huggins, etc) by age 4 or 5 (i know i was in kindergarten). in first grade i read anne of green gables, and i finished it, although i did find it to be rather dull. i read the chronicles of narnia that year as well.
i’ve always adored reading. i had a wide selection. so while i read anne of green gables when i was 7, i still read beverly cleary books too. i’ve lost count of the number of times i read the little house series, and i even had a large collection of the babysitter’s club series. i’d have “young adult” books sitting next to jane eyre, i wasn’t too picky.
although i also consider it normal to not learn how to read until age 5 or 6. each kid has their own learning abilities, and more importantly, some people experience better learning methods as well.
Well, my mom claims I was reading at around 2 (not that I have any memory of that, or much else that happened before I entered college – some things are best forgotten). However, I didn’t talk very much until I was well into grade school.
In fact, my lack of speech got me put into the lower-ability first grade class (this was back in 1969, when the local school system tracked kids by perceived ability). However, after about a week in that class, the teacher spotted me reading a book intended for third-graders, which gave her the idea that maybe I shouldn’t be in her class. The next day, I was transferred to the highest-ability first grade class, and was at the top of the class from then all the way through high school.
Reading before 2 years. Reading Wizard of Earthsea as my school reading book at 7 or younger.
Average? No. Normal? Yes. There are always early readers and intelligent children. I was the bright kid of my class in my small rural school.
Being an early reader doesn’t make me special, or better, or cooler as an adult.
I have worked in educational publishing for several years, and I know reasonably well what level average, below average and above average British kids read at for ages 7-16. There’s no point in comparing me as a child with the average kid today, except for transient “woo, look, I was clever” novelty value.
I was the bright kid at my small, underfunded, wrong-side-of-the-tracks school. I remember being incredulous that the other kids in my kindergarten class couldn’t read…and many of them still couldn’t, three years later.
I read Charlotte’s Web at 4, and was reading the papers by age 6. I’m still more up-to-date on current events than most people I know.
I don’t remember learning how to read. In fact, I can’t remember ever not knowing how to read.
When I was around five and six years old, I was reading (and comprehending) my mom’s Modern Encyclopedia of Baby and Child Care, which I think is written on about an eighth grade level.
During this same time frame, we were reading “Pug” in school- Pug being the name of a reading primer book series geared at first and second graders. It was on the order of “See Pug. Pug is a dog. See Jane. Jane is a girl. See Dick. Dick is a boy.” I actually flunked third grade reading class because a large portion of our grade was based on this thing called SRA- these funky largish cards with some kind of factual written material on one side, and comprehension test type questions on the other. I never did the actual work, because I spent a lot of time poking through the file box of SRA cards looking for something interesting to read, and finding nothing worth my while, never actually read any of them, thus not answering the questions on the backs of the cards…
Funny thing is, though I was in a third-grade math class when I was in the second grade, it never occurred to anyone that I might be an advanced reader as well…
I’d say it was moderately advanced, but by no means abnormal. The average 7 year old, at least from what I recall tutoring second graders, ranges from picture books to early chapter books(does anyone else hate the “Junie B. Jones” series?) The books you listed are a somewhat higher level than that.
Looking back at my own reading ablities, I’m surprised I didn’t have an interest in adult novels until I was ten, (my first pick? The Thorn Birds) because by age nine my reading comprehension scores were already coming out at the grade ten six month precentiles. I didn’t read anything but children’s and YA books until then…guess I didn’t realize how interesting they could be! I’d say my reading skills weren’t really that abnormal either because of that.
My brother, on the other hand, picked up reading at what I’d say is an abnormal rate. He refused to even try to learn simple words, other than his name, until he was six years old- which bothered my parents since I’d started reading by age four. He started readiness (pre-first grade) not being able to read at all, but was reading as well as a third or fourth grader by the end of the year. And he taught himself to read some how, to the surprise of both our parents and his teachers…
I was also reading fairly young. I know I read Alice in Wonderland at 7 years old, and it was far from my first “adult” book… And I was reading the Straight Dope by 8/9!
In the first grade, I was in the second grade reading group. In the second grade, I was in the third grade reading group.
By the time I was 11, I was spending my days in Alexandria, at the great Scriptitorium. Many was the endless day, sunlight streaming into the great rooms. The world’s wisdom at my finger tip.
But…it was a dusty place, and one day in a terribly fit of sneezing, my leather-clad foot knocked into the oil lamp as it sat on a lovely floor length candelabra that held the lamp.
I’ve carried that guilt with me for thousands of years. So, a little sneeze and all of a sudden, all of the accumulated history and knowledge is lost? FOREVER???
People are SO unforgiving. :wally
Seriously, I was always reading a grade or two ahead. Mom was a teacher, reading happened early on and never stopped for anything. I always have a book or two on hand, and a few New Yorker’s to boot.
Where would we be without love of reading??? Still stuck with Cuniform?
