For the Love of Literacy

The ability to read and write is the key to lifelong success in this world, and literacy begins the moment a child picks up his or her first pencil or crayon. The connection between reading and writing has existed for countless years in education, and I feel that it is crucially important today that we not lose sight of this.

I remember early in my career at IBM, when I worked as an Educational Marketing Representative, I saw firsthand the power of products like Writing to Read, which helped young Kindergarten and First Grade students learn to read through the act of writing.

The truth is that the physical act of writing, first phonetically, then with accurate spelling, creates a bridge to literacy (the ability to read) at a very early age.  When I saw that those young Writing to Read students consistently outperformed their counterparts in reading fluency, comprehension and other language arts components, like spelling and writing texts, I knew I would always strive to promote literacy to school age children in any way that I could.