Dan Gutman - My Weird Reading Tips

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To Bria Ragin

The reading comprehension passages in this book were excerpted from the following previously published books:

My Weirder School #7: Miss Kraft Is Daft! 2012 by Dan Gutman;
My Weirder School #4: Mr. Burke Is Berserk 2012 by Dan Gutman;
My Weird School Fast Facts: Geography 2016 by Dan Gutman;
My Weirdest School #4: Mrs. Meyer Is on Fire! 2016 by Dan Gutman;
My Weirder School #12: Mrs. Lane Is a Pain! 2014 by Dan Gutman;
My Weirder School #6: Mayor Hubble Is in Trouble! 2012 by Dan Gutman;
My Weirdest School #5: Miss Daisy Is Still Crazy! 2016 by Dan Gutman;
My Weirdest School #1: Mr. Cooper Is Super! 2015 by Dan Gutman;
My Weirdest School #10: Miss Newman Isnt Human! 2018 by Dan Gutman;
My Weird School Fast Facts: Dinosaurs, Dodos, and Woolly Mammoths 2018 by Dan Gutman;
My Weird School Daze #12: Ms. Leakey Is Freaky! 2011 by Dan Gutman;
My Weirdest School #6: Mr. Nick Is a Lunatic! 2016 by Dan Gutman;
My Weird School: Talent Show Mix-Up 2016 by Dan Gutman;
My Weird School: Teamwork Trouble 2018 by Dan Gutman;
My Weird School Goes to the Museum 2016 by Dan Gutman;
My Weirdest School #8: Mrs. Master Is a Disaster! 2017 by Dan Gutman;
My Weirdest School #12: Ms. Hall Is a Goofball! 2018 by Dan Gutman

The author gratefully acknowledges the editorial contributions of Bridget Heos.

MY WEIRD READING TIPS . Text copyright 2019 by Dan Gutman. Illustrations copyright 2019 by Jim Paillot. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

www.harpercollinschildrens.com

Cover art 2019 by Jim Paillot

Digital Edition MAY 2019 ISBN: 978-0-06-288241-7

ISBN 978-0-06-288239-4 (pbk. bdg.)Print ISBN: 978-0-06-288240-0 (library bdg.)

19 20 21 22 23 PC / LSCH 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

FIRST EDITION

Contents

My name is Dan, and I hate reading.

Well, I used to hate it, anyway. When I was a kid in second and third grade, I didnt like to read. My parents werent happy about that, of course. Both of them were big readers. There were lots of books around the house. My mom and dad were reading all the time, it seemed. So was my older sister, Lucy. But not me.

Like a lot of kids, I found reading to be hard to do. It was hard to put the letters together to make words. It was hard to fit the words into sentences that made sense, the sentences into paragraphs, and the paragraphs into chapters. It wasnt any fun for me. It was work, and it was boring work. I would rather be outside playing baseball, or riding my bike.

But at some point, I changed my mind. I got it. Reading didnt have to be boring. It could be fun. It was like a light switch turned on and the room wasnt dark anymore.

Today I love to read, and I read just about all the time.

I hope he doesnt read while hes in the shower. That would be weird.

My mother was amazed when I grew up and became a professional writer. Now, wherever I go, I take a book, a magazine, or a newspaper with me in case I have a spare moment to catch up on my reading. I like to learn new stuff.

Ill tell you what changed things for mesports. I was a big baseball fan as a kid. I rooted for the New York Mets (and still do). I wanted to find out more about baseball. When I was a kid, believe it or not, you couldnt go online and just google anything you wanted to know about. It wasnt that easy. Google didnt exist. The Internet didnt exist. In fact, personal computers and cell phones didnt even exist!

That must have been a million hundred years ago.

Can you imagine what life was like in those prehistoric times? When I was a kid and I wanted to find out about something, I had to read about it. My parents had a complete set of the Encyclopedia Britannica on a shelf in the living room, and a big, thick dictionary. But more often than not, I had to go to the library.

So I gobbled up books, magazines, and newspaper articles about baseball and other sports. I memorized the statistics on the back of my baseball cards. And slowly but surely, I discovered that reading was fun when I was reading about something that interested me. To this day, I find it hard to read things that dont interest me. Its hard to concentrate.

I know that a lot of kids out there dont like reading, just like me. Maybe you try to avoid it. Maybe you just refuse to do it. But lets get real. Youre going to have to do a lot of reading in your life, whether you like it or not. Street signs. Texts from your friends. Maps. Emails. Instruction manuals. Even if you never pick up a book, words are all around you. Its a skill we all have to learn.

So this book is for all you kids out there who claim you hate to read. You really dont. You just havent found the book that turns on that light switch. But it will happen. And you know what? You may just discover that reading is fun!

Cheers,

Dan Gutman

P.S.: Oh, by the way, this book isnt going to be some boring lesson that just teaches you how to read better. It will include tips and activities to help you improve your reading skills, but its not a lecture. Its a My Weird School book! Even if youre a fan of the series, you probably dont even realize all the ways that youre becoming a better reader when you read a My Weird School book. But A.J., Andrea, and I are going to tell you the secrets of My Weird School.

Shhhhh! Dont tell anybody. Ready? Lets go!