SHARON M. DRAPER

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"Once upon a time" was a long time ago. Children of 20 or 50 years ago were fascinated and mesmerized by those words, which conjured up thoughts of castles and mysteries, heroes and villains, princes and monsters, and dreams. Children today, however, may have never even heard those words and are much more in tune to the theme song of a television program. Young people need to read more, and they need to read better, as the demands of higher education and workplace literacy increase. They may learn the basics of reading in school, but they don't always come to love reading in the process.

Many students lead full and hectic lives. Their days are hurried, pushed, and scheduled. They go to soccer practice, ballet lessons, and gymnastics. They heat their dinner in the microwave, watch television, do homework, and then fall asleep in exhaustion to start the routine again the next day. Their world has very little time for leisurely, extended periods of reading. Our current way of living rarely encourages, applauds, or celebrates the joy of reading. Some children today grow up with minimal reading skills and minimal reading joy. By the time they get to junior high, the enjoyment of reading is atrophied, and a young person with an extra fifteen dollars, when given the choice, will buy a compact music disc instead of a book. It is a difficult but not insurmountable problem.

A child who is just learning to read and is successfully mastering the process finds great joy from victory in the battle to decipher those marks on a page of text. Many very young children have a large variety of sight words in their vocabulary from prominent advertising of fast-food restaurants, bottled sodas, and brand-name athletic clothing. They know the products and ask for them by name. The power in the knowledge and the rewards that come with the connection between the symbol and the product are established and reinforced very early. As reading educators, we must build on this positive synergy that already exists and expand it into the classroom and beyond. Research supports this need to make connections between children's lives and the books they read. When children are "motivated to want to read for authentic purposes" and can make meaningful connections between reading and their own lives, their motivation to read becomes intrinsic (Braunger and Lewis, 1998). Reading cannot exist simply as a school subject. "Readers need to see reasons and purposes for reading that connect to their own perception of the world," (Braunger and Lewis, 1998).

In order to make reading palatable as well as profitable for students today, educators must make reading as fashionable as the latest designer shoes, as desirable as the most popular fast food, and as valuable as the most high–tech video game. It's a matter of marketing. Reading, which is the key to a world of knowledge, must compete with and conquer the forces that push reading to the bottom of the book bag in the priority system of students today.

How can this be done? The commercial and academic worlds must merge. There must be a concerted effort of the school world and the real world to join forces for the purpose of encouraging and advocating reading. The people and elements that surround children — friends, teachers, family members, television and media personalities — should demonstrate the act of reading and act as heralds to proclaim the importance of reading. When the entire community is involved with reading campaigns, an environment that encourages reading for a better future can be created; children will begin to understand that reading is more than a subject in school but also "a valuable part of every facet of life" (Rouk, nd.).

But even with academic, corporate, media, and celebrity support, our efforts will fail without the help of parents and families of the children. Research proves that "students who are avid readers come from homes in which reading is encouraged by a parent, grandparent, older brother or sister, or even a baby–sitter" (Anderson, Hiebert, Scott, and Wilkinson, 1985). Studies have clearly shown that family literacy experiences can have a positive influence on students' literacy achievement in school (Schickendanz, 1981; Snow and Goldfield, 1983; Teale and Sulzby, 1986). It is from parents that children should be first introduced to the love of words and books.

Our media campaign must include parents, for we need to create a world of readers, not just a school yard full of them. Perhaps the child will become the teacher. Even a parent who cannot read can participate in the process of sharing books. In all families, parents learn from their children. For this reason, "intergenerational learning is often said to be bi-directional, particularly once children enter school" (Gadsen, 1998). If it takes the child to introduce the parent to books, then so be it, as long as the books are shared.