The fastest way to teach a child to read is to teach them to write.

You're not lonely when you're teaching, you're not quiet, you're laughing most of the time, you're having a wonderful time interacting with young people. It's the best fun in the world.

If we are always reading aloud something that is more difficult than children can read themselves then when they come to that book later, or books like that, they will be able to read them - which is why even a fifth grade teacher, even a tenth grade teacher, should still be reading to children aloud. There is always something that is too intractable for kids to read on their own.

I think that my favourite animal is a baby possum, or a joey. The face of a really little joey is so divine - so, so gorgeous.

I don't go to church much anymore, but Methodist values still wind me up and send me ticking into my daily life.

Experts in literacy and child development have discovered that if children know eight nursery rhymes by heart by the time they’re four years old, they’re usually among the best readers by the time they’re eight.

I have very little patience with children.