“The moment you doubt whether you can fly, you cease for ever to be able to do it.” – Peter Pan,  J.M. Barrie 

As you are reading this, many of you will have been matched to your student(s) and perhaps met them for the first time. You will soon understand what an awesome opportunity you have to make a child believe that they can fly. Many of our children are just becoming developmentally ready to learn to read. But because of educational pressures that are brought to bear, they might believe that they are not very good at it, that it is hard, and that they just don’t like it. Although our Reading Buddies are trained on how to assist their students with fluency, accuracy, and comprehension, another major factor in their reading improvement is that of “fostering self-confidence and an enjoyment of reading.” It may be a cliché to say that our Reading Buddies are “the wind beneath our children’s wings,” but it is true! By taking time out of our busy lives, we show them they are important to us, and to reassure them at every opportunity that they can do this, we provide that ever important sense of self-worth and empowerment.

If you have not currently signed up to be a Reading Buddy, don’t wait.  Let’s let Peter be our guide as we share our lives with our students and teach them to fly. “The second star to the right shines in the night for you, to tell you that the dreams you have really can come true.”