For my project, I decided to interview my grandma, who I call nanny, on how she learned how to read and write. I honestly wish that she would have written a book about her life because just listening to her talk about her childhood was amazing. 

My nanny’s name is May Williams and she is 86 years old. She grew up in Liverpool, which is a city in England. Her english accent is still strong to this day and I absolutely love it. 

She said that she started school when she was 4 1/2-years-old, and she attended an all girls school. I asked her if her parents had taught her how to read and write before starting school, and she answered with a resounding “no.” This is so different from how it is today. Most parents make it a priority to teach their children how to read and write before attending school; however, she said that they just taught her how to in school. 

Another thing that shocked me was that whenever I asked her if she wrote creatively, like writing stories, she said that they did not. They mostly taught her how to print. 

One of the most vivid memories that she had of reading in school was being split up into groups based on how well they could read. There was an A, B, and C group. "A" being the best reader, and "C" being the worst reader. This is very similar to what schools do today. She was in the A group, but she hated it because none of her friends were in it. I thought it was funny because she said that she always told her friends that they needed to get better so that they could be in her group. 

Being in reading groups, however, did not make her love reading any less. To this day, she still absolutely loves to read. In fact, she said that she needed more books because she just finished all of the ones that she had. She told me that she once got to visit one of her favorite authors' house too. Additionally, she said that she used to visit the library in downtown Greensburg all of the time to get books.