Literacy has been my passion since I taught 4-year-olds in my neighborhood what I learned each day in first grade as we played school after I came home from my lessons for the day. Some of the mothers made their kids come down to my house to a makeshift “school” in my garage because they came home knowing their letters and numbers. In those days, we had no free kindergarten; only the “rich” kids went to kindergarten, which was often a private affair at a retired teacher’s home. Because I was a “late birthday,” November 21st, I ended up being seven two months after first grade started. I was the smallest in the class with the loudest voice and the bossiest manner. Because it was wartime (Korean War), our elementary school was crowded with Navy “brats” in our town which housed both a Navy Base and an Amphibious…
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