Wednesday, June 25, 2008

Yay, Oprah!

OK, before you get too excited, please know that I am NOT writing about Oprah, rather about something she reinvigorated that is important to me and my learning right now: the book club.

I am the type of person who will hear about a book and jump up to read it, only to realize that I read it a while back (yes, I am getting old.) Nothing against re-reading, but why when you can read something new? 

Right now I'm faced with hundreds of pages of educational theory to read every night. It's interesting, but when you are trying to do it at 10:30 after you've fed your family, bathed and read to the kids, and done some laundry, it's a little hard to do more than just get the gist, not to mention trying to look at the reading with different lenses (impossible at 10:30, really- isn't 10:30 the realm of evening news, trashy novels read in the comfort of your bed, or, dare I speak its name... KNITTING?) Because we are discussing our readings in depth with a variety of groupings, I am getting things out of it that I would never have in isolation. It is SO VERY important to read in a group, in fact I am feeling that it is essential to read something with at least one other person to bounce ideas and thoughts off of- this is for all kinds of reading.

Isn't the aim of reading to understand, after all, and what better way to understand than to get the viewpoint of others?

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