If you are not reading by the second grade:
Everyone flips out
It makes sense, I guess.
We need to know how to read.
(No matter that most adults never read another book after they finish school…)
Fool around here – fool around there – but you better be reading by the second grade.
Go ahead, try it.
You little rugrat.
Mess around for one more year, and give your parents a heart attack.
There wasn’t much pressure for anyone to read in first grade, but by second grade, it was apparently critical to national security that your kid be reading. He brought home bulletins from time to time to this effect.
-Anne Lamott, Traveling Mercies (Amazon)