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Show 4'- " -.''- ns- f -. - " i - f i iinriiiniiiiir ;irTiiiB-iirj'iinifi j fu,... i --- - -: - I - I ? I 1 r"4 I I f ; X X : ' -I T3 O O 00 o ? 3 3 O 3 Stephen Hatch, shown here with some of the 624 books he recently read. Super reader breaks all records Stephen Hatch, first grade student stu-dent at Boulton Elementary School, took his teacher's reading challenge seriously and read over 25,214 pages (624 books) in less than a month. It all started when his teacher, Mrs. Walker, decided to have a reading contest in her class. The children would not be competing against each other, but against themselves. The note sent home read, "During the last two months of the school year our class will be having a reading contest. On May 30 there will be a reading party in which each student in the class will receive awards for the number of books they read. ' Mrs. Walker instructed the students to send her a note as the books were read listing the title of each book along with the number of pages in that book. With no prompting from either his teacher or his parents, Stephen set his own goal to set his alarm clock for 5:30 a.m. and read for about three hours in the morning before school His mother said, "I would get up early in the morning to walk and I would hear Stephen's voice coming out of his bedroom. He was reading out loud! Stephen did not get up early every morning, but he did put in a lot of reading time every day. He also found time to play with his friends every day. When the contest first began, Stephen went to his shelf in the library in his home and found about 60 books on his reading level. He read through them in a couple of days and then begged his mother to take him to the library. " Will you check me out as many books as I can read, Mom?" he asked. His mother reassured him that she would keep him in books. When they arrived at the library he wanted to check out 100 books. "Stephen," his mother said, "you will not read that many books. Let's check out 25." "Please, Mom, he begged. "I promise I will read them. I promise." prom-ise." So they checked out about 50 books. In just a few days Stephen had read all of the books. He started begging to go back to the library. So back to the library he went. This time his mother believed him, and she let Stephen choose his own books from the first grade shelf. They checked out around 100 books. The library clerk exclaimed, "This has to be some type of record. Never have I checked out so many books to one person at one time." The problem came in carrying carry-ing the books back to the car. The parking lot is some distance away from the library door, and Mom about broke her back carrying the books to the car. It was about a week, and Stephen wanted more books. Mom's back was still hurting, so she took Stephen and her older son, John, age 9, to help carry the books. Trips to the library became so frequent that Mom was wearing out, so she wrote a note to the teacher saying, "Would it be all right if Stephen reads these books more than once? This will save on trips to the library." The teacher agreed and Stephen read some of his favorites over and over. Garfield, dragons and dinosaurs were just a few of Stephen's star characters. One book that he read many times was "The Boy Who Cried Wolf," but it was obvious to his teacher and his mom that Stephen was not joking about his reading. Mrs. Hatch was a little embarrassed em-barrassed in sending such outlandish outlan-dish reports to school with Stephen each day. She said that she couldn't expect Stephen's teacher to believe that he was really reading that much, and she was afraid that the teacher would think that she was forcing Stephen to do too much. So Stephen's mother decided to go talk to the teacher. I According to Mrs. Hatch, I Stephen is not 'your basic whiz kid I or genius." He is just a normal, I well-adjusted kid that loves to play I and be with his friends. He does I well in school, but it was not his I reading ability that motivated him. I He just learned that reading is fun, I and it feels good to succeed. I Obviously, when the contest end I ed no one could even begin to mat- I ch Stephen's record. Principal I Steve Burningham honored Stephen for his achievement. Mrs. Walker I said she had never heard of a stu- I dent reading as much as Stephen I had. Stephen assured her he wasn't I finished yet. |
