I actually credit this book for leading me into the career path that I chose. The summer that I read it I was in the process of changing majors, and I was looking for some sort of direction. I knew that I wanted to help children with something, and a quote that Holden says in the book opened my eyes to where I was going.
In the novel, the main character Holden Caulfield states this, “Anyway, I keep picturing all these little kids playing some game in this big field of rye and all. Thousands of little kids, and nobody's around - nobody big, I mean - except me. And I'm standing on the edge of some crazy cliff. What I have to do, I have to catch everybody if they start to go over the cliff - I mean if they're running and they don't look where they're going I have to come out from somewhere and catch them. That's all I do all day. I'd just be the catcher in the rye and all. I know it's crazy, but that's the only thing I'd really like to be." I couldn’t have spoken these words better myself. I look at all of the students I’m going to encounter in the future in this way. They’re all playing on the cliff and struggling in their own way near the edge. I want to be there to provide a helping hand along the way. It is my goal to not let any student near the edge of the cliff. If I can share my passion for reading and learning with them, and if I can connect to them in a way that is individualized for them, then I know I can be their catcher in the rye.
D is for Dianne Searfoss. Dianne isn't only my mother, but she was also one of my high school English teachers. She is one of a set of three ladies that I credit for helping develop my love for reading and inspiring me to teach (along with Kelli Malchow and Marianna Hofer). My mother had a real passion for teaching reading. She taught English and social sciences, and even in her sociology class we had the chance to read a novel.
I always admired her teaching style because she knew how to get her students interested in what was being read. We read a lot as a group in her classroom, and the stories would always come alive. We also had some of the most thought-provoking conversations about the literature afterwards. I came out of her classroom each day loving reading and literature even more than earlier that day.
Outside of the classroom, my mother has also done her part to influence my life with literacy. She has been a lifelong reader and learner, and she made sure to pass that down to my siblings and myself. Every holiday we were given books upon books. I remember hitting up every library book sale and coming home with boxes of volumes to fill our bookshelves that were already overflowing with books. She made the process of reading fun by making it a lifelong game to find the next best book. To this day, we still talk with one another about what we're reading. She shares her books with me and I share my books with her. Although we like different genres at times, we can come to a consensus on the merit of many books, and that makes the process of shared reading fun. She helped teach me how to read when I was little, so now I give back my becoming part of the conversation for books I wouldn't think about picking up on my own, and I think that has opened my eyes to the wonders of books and reading more than anything.
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| At my college graduation party |
