Harry Potter

[elfdream]

I read them as they came out as my children were among the 'first' generation readers of the series. I had to see if all the evil witchcraft accusations were true. I wasn't really reading them for personal enjoyment, just trying to be a good parent.

Guess what?

[myotch]

(11-17-2011 11:21 AM)elfdream Wrote:  I read them as they came out as my children were among the 'first' generation readers of the series. I had to see if all the evil witchcraft accusations were true. I wasn't really reading them for personal enjoyment, just trying to be a good parent.

Guess what?

YES!

We were all fundied-up over Harry Potter, too. Then the first movie was going to come out - our kid was in first grade at the time. So we were trying to deal with what we were going to tell our son when he wanted to see the movie.

Also at this time, we were conferring with our son's teacher over some, well, poor grades and attention problems. Not terrible grades. Not even that bad of an attention problem, but enough for everyone to notice.

We asked the teacher's counsel, and she said that reading is going to be the most important part of his academic development, and she recommended the Potter series. We were confused - we knew the teacher was a Christian. Why would she recommend the book?

I decided to buy the first book, and see for myself the occult references, the stuff that blatantly went against what the Bible taught. The acute Wiccan programming that I heard so much about and bought into. What I found was a book rich with metaphor, allegory, and symbolism of, well, an "every kid", where magical ability is parallel to personal ability, where magic itself is symbolic of science and technology, and a world where uniqueness is valued.

I fondly cherish those nights when we as a family read for a full hour aloud a few Harry Potter chapters. Before we knew it, we were through with the first book, and then the second. My son so looked forward to more Harry Potter. We handed him the third book, and told him he had to read it himself. *BOOM* That kid started reading, he asked us to help him with some of the words, but before we knew it, he was reading far above his grade level.

He still loves to read. I thank God for Harry Potter, because the series was incredibly instrumental in helping develop my son. He's smart, gifted even, and is developing some writing skills of his own - at 16, he's a staff writer for one of the video game blogs, and is in competition for Governor's Honors award in communication.

After we went to see the last movie, my son said he was sad, because it was the death of his childhood. Yeah, we all shed a tear.

[senda wales]

(11-17-2011 04:32 PM)myotch Wrote:  He still loves to read. I thank God for Harry Potter, because the series was incredibly instrumental in helping develop my son. He's smart, gifted even, and is developing some writing skills of his own - at 16, he's a staff writer for one of the video game blogs, and is in competition for Governor's Honors award in communication.

After we went to see the last movie, my son said he was sad, because it was the death of his childhood. Yeah, we all shed a tear.

The fundies I ran with weren't overly concerned with banning books, so I felt free to read whatever I wanted. So yeah, it felt like the death of my childhood too. I started reading Harry Potter sometime in 2000. The first online communities I got involved in were Harry Potter fan communities. I learned how to type fast because I spent so much time in HP chatrooms and I learned HTML so I could make my own HP websites. Almost taught a class on Harry Potter back in college too. I credit Harry Potter for a lot of what I know about online communities.

[Sharon]

(11-17-2011 08:01 AM)Darrell Wrote:  

Quote:I love the audio books, as read by Jim Dale. They are wonderful, and I have the whole set.

That's what I've been listening to for the last...six months?

Have you finished them all? Or which book are you on?