Grinding Through Reading Grit

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By Mark W.F. Condon, Unite for Literacy vice president

We’ve all found ourselves in over-our-heads reading. The material could be focused on a technical topic, in-depth research, a philosophical treatise, or something like James Joyce’s “Ulysses.”

At some point in our wading through the challenging material, perhaps even early on, we came to the realization that we weren’t going to “get it” all and that some of what we were getting might not be quite in line with what the author intended. Yet we keep reading.

How do we do that? Why do we do that?

I think it’s because mature readers know that while readers with stronger backgrounds in any given material’s subject matter may get more from it, we may still be able to get what we came for in the first place. There doesn’t need to be a perfect match between the author’s intentions and ours.

How did we all come to this conclusion?

Certainly, it’s not because we sat through a series of lessons focused upon developing what lately has been referred to as “grit.”

Over years of reading material with a range of challenge levels that differ for each of us, from way easy to way difficult, we came to the realization that there really isn’t any reading material so hard that we can’t get something from plowing through it.

So where, when, and how might such lessons in literacy grit begin?

The mantra here at Unite for Literacy is: “Read together. Talk about what you read. Relax and have fun.” Within this mantra is the key to the answer to this question.

When family members and teachers share books, the conversation often tends to focus on the content of the material, the vocabulary, the subtleties of language, and so on. However, the focus can be broadened by the leader in a reading and discussion event if they step back and reflect out loud: “Wow! This is a hard book, but I’m liking it!” or “Oh, I’m not sure what the definition of that word is. Let’s look it up.” Or “It’s hard to tell what all of that means for us, but for me it means…” Or “This book is too hard right now. Let’s come back to it after we’ve read others about the same subject, perhaps understanding a bit more.”

With each reading event, the grit that is such an important contributor to a child’s tenacity in problem solving and their endurance in getting out of books what they came for can be augmented for even the youngest and least experienced readers. How? By the relaxed sharing with them of our personal reading struggles. Recounting our own reading journey sends a message to children that everyone gets what they can from their reading. Some books are very easy and some are quite challenging, but all of them contain a lesson or message, even if it’s that this book needs to be put aside for now.

Joy in reading and satisfaction in growth in personal reading strategies can happen with every book a child encounters.