They just didn’t want to read. Rewards and incentives that usually worked for first graders held no sway. But between the start of the school year in September and the close of their reading program in late May, a tiny miracle unfolded. Twenty-six disinterested, diffident six- and seven-year-olds discovered they could read—and loved it! By the end of the year, Crystal Salmi’s first-grade class at Warrenton Grade School in Warrenton, Oregon had set a new standard for achievement, together reading nearly five million words in more than 7,000 books.
