Les King, former Carolinas district governor, former high-school physics teacher, and past and continuing advocate for 'learning to read as the most important education skill for a successful cycle in school and life' gave our Club members an inspiring talk on helping children to read. Les showed educational research results that point to 'reading with kids' as the most important factor in success for learning to read ahead of flash cards and other reading tools. For children who first enter the education system in this country, those that learn to read go on to have 'a successful cycle' in their life as opposed to non-readers who often follow the 'failing spiral' in life as 'things' never work out for them.
-Les when on to explain 'how easy it is' to read with kids. Beginning with simple sounds and words with few letters, readers soon master their first, 25-word bank. From there on reading stories in a series of booklets with short three- to four-word sentences encourages kids to want to 'read more' as they begin to become successful readers. Over the years, Les has worked out simple strategies for working with kids to read. He encouraged Kiwanians to sign up for reading with the younger kids in the Pender school district who were behind reading level. As an example of the personal reward mentors can have in reading with kids, Les gave us the story of 'Chandra' who along with her four brothers and sisters entered the Pender school system after their single-parent mom could no longer homeschool them By that time, Chandra was in second grade and could not read. Thus, she did not know what was going on in class and soon faced teasing and developed a lack of self-esteem, a situation that can then lead to that 'downward failing spiral' in life. Les took on the challenge of helping Chandra learn to read. Turns out she was a keen and willing learner who really wanted to read. Long story short, Chandra was reading at fourth-grade level at the end of her second-grade curriculum! All because Les took the time to help Chandra learn to read. She went on to become a successful college student and Les has the gratifying satisfaction of knowing the 'key' role he really played in Chandra's life. Thanks, Les for this heartfelt story and your encouragement to our Kiwanians to participate in 'reading with kids.''