My earliest memory of reading dates back to roughly first grade, and it was more of a recurring event. Each night before bed, my father would read a book of our choice to my sister and me.
Although, one series quickly became the most voted after we realized the potential of entertainment possible with just a book. This series was the “Berenstain Bears” written by Jan Berenstain and Stan Berenstain. The reason for the quickly gaining popularity between my sister Bella and me was due to my dad’s implementation of unique voices for each character in the book. For example, each time Small Bear spoke or “Baby Bear” as my dad would say, it was in a high pitched helium-filled like voice, for Mama Bear he for some reason shifted to a southern twang and dialect, whereas Papa Bear was a baritone, throaty, bass-filled voice. He was usually never able to read a chapter of the short children’s book without laughing hysterically and my sister and I more than reciprocated this. On top of the voices often came a reenactment of the scenes or random inclusion of one of our names alongside a subject not mentioned in the book to make us even more amused and caught off guard. By the end of the book, there were often tears streaming down our faces and we were more awake than when we sat down for bed. My mother would come into the room and yell at both my dad and us that we should be winding down for bed yet more often than not the fun often pursued. I recall feelings of joy, merriment, and gratitude for the times my dad, sister and I shared with literature. My father’s ability to bring to life and further personify the bear characters truly made each piece of literature a memorable and blissful experience.
He attempted similar entertainment with other books; “Amelia Bedelia” by applying a posh British accent to each and every character with variation only coming based on the tone of his voice, “The Magic Tree House” consisted of more play on words, “If You Give a Mouse a Cookie” series would seemingly never end given he imagined other things the mouse may want with each item, and the list goes on. But none of these efforts would ever top the “Berenstain Bears”.
However, what each instance did teach me was the endless possibilities, value, and merit that literacy can provide. I was taught that words can be expanded into endless forms of entertainment via imagination, creativity, and a desire to learn more about the formalist, historical-biographical, and moral-philosophical approaches to reading. I believe to be a proper reader all literary approaches must be cycled in a text to gain further understanding, and at the same time, one’s imagination is often necessary for enjoyment as I learned firsthand at an early age. To this day, one of my least favorite parts of growing older would be the lack of Baby Bear, Mama Bear, and Papa Bear voices being used in readings as I once heard each night thanks to the small times of leisure my father and I shared.
What a great father to bring to life the varied characters through being the narrator for you. That awesome. Thanks for sharing.
I also have very vague memories of reading Berenstain bears with my older brother and my dad and I do remember enjoying those times. While that love for reading may have died down quite a bit for me, I think it’s really great that you found creativity with your experiences. Storytelling and an exchange of experience are both extremely important to literature and your dad’s unique voices and storytelling definitely amplify that. Those that stray away from reading often mention its boring aspects or slow pace, but for you to have internalized a strong method of finding leisure and entertainment is so beneficial. I am definitely one of those that complain about boring passages or slow paced plots, but I don’t know, maybe your dad is onto something. That may be the bridge to finding a love for reading, sparking creativity and making the experience as realistic, entertaining, imaginative, and eventful for you as possible.
I found your description of the different voices your dad used, and just the extra mile that your dad went while reading a book to you and your sister, really entertaining. I can see how, as a little kid, you got excited for reading time because of the environment you grew up in which shed a positive light on literature. I agree with the idea that imagination is very important to use while reading a book. Literature is just words on a page, and it’s easy to skim them and take nothing from it. Basically, literature is what you make it; how you read it, how you use your own experiences to develop your own unique understanding of the text. I also agree that it is beneficial to approach a piece of literature with multiple critical reading styles. Each style has its strengths and weaknesses, and a combination of the three allows you to take into consideration more factors while developing your understanding of the text.
Alex, The Berenstein Bears was also a comforting series for me when I was a kid! I loved getting to know the various characters and following their many adventures. Your experience of this series sounds particularly special; it was a nightly ritual that brought you, your sister, and your dad closer together. I admire your dad’s efforts to make this experience entertaining and comical; it sounds like he was positive literacy sponsor for you, unlocking your imagination and creativity at a young age. I like the points you made in your reflection at the end, specifically that all literary approaches must be implemented to get the most out of a piece of literature. For you, this early experience showed you the Reader Response approach, but as you got older, you began to realize the importance of the other approaches and how they can make you a better reader. But, like you, reading has not been an imaginative experience for me anymore, and I miss when my mom would read to me and embellish the characters.
I remember reading and also being obsessed with the Berenstain Bears when I was younger. I think it’s fitting that this series about family created such a special experience for your own family. If all the stories my parents read to me were narrated in the way your dad did, I would have also been dying with laughter. Reading in voices that match the character really just adds to the whole experience and can make reading that much more enjoyable. And as you said, it opened your mind to so many more literary elements and approaches. You gained a lot of knowledge about literacy and reading as it relates to imagination. I do think that imagination is such a big factor in reading, as words wouldn’t mean much if you couldn’t turn words into scenes and feelings. Overall, I really liked your narrative and how you tied your childhood reading experience with the Berenstain Bears into how you approach literacy now.