I only read 3 books, and now I'm an English teacher
Warren-Grice, April

>>APRIL: I am April Warren-Grice and this is my literacy narrative. 

[People talking loudly in background]

>>APRIL: The first book that I remember - I have two books actually - one was like a Bible story that was huge, probably half my body size. The other was a Cinderella book, those were the two books that I remember [Inaudible] under the age of seven. I remember I pretended to read both books and I guess because I had memorized the story [Inaudible]. Those were the books that I remember, however, through elementary school I only read two books and I guess that's kind of ironic because now I'm an English teacher. The two books that I remember reading, one was Thomas Edison because it was a book report and I had to do it for school. The other was "The Boxcar Children" and I actually read that on my own. The Thomas Edison book was I think in the second grade that I read that book and I remember because "The Boxcar Children", the only reason I read that book is because I would go to the library every week with the class and get these books and say, "Oh I want to read the books, I want to read books." so I was so excited to read the books, however, I never the books because I was usually outside playing, I don't know, or watching TV. So I really wanted to read a book because that's what all the smart kids were doing. So this particular time I checked out "The Boxcar Children" and that particular week I think I got in trouble and I was on punishment so I couldn't go outside and couldn't watch TV so I remember sitting on the couch at my grandmother's house and was like, "Well I guess I'll read this book." I started reading it and I probably read over half of it that evening and I think I finished it the next few nights. I like, "Wow, this was a really good book. I should read more often." As I said before I would always check out books and even renew them because I was determined to read them but never read them. So that was in elementary school I think in the fourth or fifth grade, I think it was the fifth grade. So going into the seventh grade, I didn't really read anything in the sixth grade unless it was for school, into the seventh grade I remember babysitting my sister and some of the neighborhood kids and some of my stepsisters or cousins and so we needed something to do in the summer time so I was like, "Hey, we'll play school." Of course I was the teacher; so we were going to play school but we needed books, we needed resources so I said, "Let's ride our bikes to the library." So it would give us a field trip and the material for the lessons. We went to the library and I made them get out books and then we would ride our bikes back home and play school and I would say, "Alright, it's time to read." One of the other reasons that I wanted to ride our bikes to the library was for two reasons I guess. One was because I wanted my sister and my other friends and the neighborhood friends were all black, I wanted them to be the smart kids that everyone went to for the answers and always thought the white kids, everyone went to them for the answers and I thought the books were the way to get smart. So I said, "We've got to read these books." I just remember my little stepsister and cousin saying, "Why do we have to read these stupid books?" And I said, "Because reading is important," and I was the teacher so I had to do the whole teacher thing. So they had begun reading but then one of the neighborhood kids, he was probably one of the youngest, he said, "Can you help me with this word?" I was like, "Yeah he wants to read." So that kind of excited me. So while they were getting books, I was getting books too, however, because I wasn't a big reader I didn't even know what books I liked and I started off reading "Encyclopedia Dramatica" books because they were mystery books and I was like, "Yeah, be a detective." So I read some of those books and those were the books that I started off with and they weren't always grade-level but they kept my interest so that's what I read. I think on to my eighth grade year, I went to the library at school to yet again get a book and read it and that's when I finally picked up "Native Son" by Richard Wright. I was like, "wow," and I actually started reading the book; I actually read the whole book and it was pretty thick. Because it was about black culture, something I could relate to, and I hadn't gotten that in any of my classes and it was the first one I'd read so I was very interested in that. I think that kind of kicked off the real reading and my interest because now I am interested in black literature or literature about marginalized groups from all over of people of color. So that was how I kicked off my reading and it's very ironic considering I'm a high school English teacher. Whenever I told that story my kids were like, "What? You only read two books?" I was like, "Yes, and you are already more advanced and more prepared than I ever was." So that was pretty exciting. I did read, growing up, maybe seven through maybe twelve when I used to get my hair done, my aunt was a beautician so she had her own shop and she had these books and considering you had to sit under the dryer forever I was like, "Oh I guess I'll read these stupid books." She had Heidi books and there was one Heidi book and I just read parts of it every time I went over there. So I guess that was another book that I read. Let's see, now through high school I started reading more black literature. I started off with Terry McMillan books, I remember reading "Disappearing Acts" and "Mama" and "Waiting to Exhale" which probably weren't "appropriate" for me at the time. However, they kept my interest and I continued to read. Once I got to college I began to read more black literature which held my attention and which I was clearly gravitating towards. When I became a teacher I made sure to incorporate literature from all different backgrounds and I made it my business because throughout the curriculum it was pretty much all white, there may be a spec of color here and there so I made it my business to reach out and get literature from Latino and African American, and Indian cultures. I went all over and it was work because, first of all, little to no other English teachers in the building would seek out that material because it was too hard to locate - well maybe not too hard to locate but it took effort and they were already busy; so I really worked hard at that. My kids were like, "Why are we reading all this stuff about other cultures?" So we had to go through that whole spiel about appreciating diversity. In the end, in most of my classes, most of my students gained a greater appreciation for it. It even went to a point where I would try to speak a different language in my classroom. So I had a Russian kid one time and would say [Russian word] which means hello or try to speak Spanish or I would try to learn languages from India or I would try to learn Swahili or whatever, just to get connected to them. I realized that when I running, I wasn't connected to the school because I was not connected to the curriculum and so therefore I said, "Well I'm going to hook you one of two ways. One: just because you want this or two: because you're interested." That's what I tried to convey to my students. When I was in college, I guess my senior year, sophomore, junior or senior year, I began to connect again to black literature so I started studying Harriet Jacobs and I was determined to diversify my curriculum and put those large black groups in the curriculum. Currently I'm working on my PhD in education policy studies; I'm trying to make sure that schools are using culturally relevant teaching practices which is an information curriculum from all different backgrounds. So that's what I hook and I'm trying to "save the world" because I told my students I'm trying to save the world so that's my effort to close the achievement gaps in all specs. So I think that's probably about it. Yeah, truly relevant teaching practices connecting students as well as myself to literature [Inaudible]. That's pretty much me in a nutshell. [Inaudible]