4-year-old genius, Daliyah Marie Arana has shone across the United States with her exceptional talent for reading, having read more than 1000 books at her young age.
Daliyah has been learning how to read even before she was born according to her parents. Her mother, Hallema Arana said in an interview with Washington post that while she was pregnant with Daliyah, she would read books to her other young children daily.
She added that when Daliyah was just an infant, she would often listen to her older brother reading chapters of books aloud at home. By the time she was 18 months old, she was already starting to recognize words from the books her mother read to her.
“She wanted to take over and do the reading on her own. It kind of took off from there. The more words she learned, the more she wanted to read,” Hallema said.
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Hallema stated that by the time Daliyah was 2 years old, the young genius had read her first book. Now at 4 years old, Daliyah has read more than 1,000 books and has also read certain college-level textbooks.
Daliyah’s skilled reading and passion for literature caught the attention of the leader of the nation’s library, Carla Hayden, the 14th Librarian of Congress and she was hosted at the Library of Congres. The Leader also gave Daliyah a chance to be the “librarian for the day.”
“She just kept saying how the Library of Congress is her most favorite, favorite, favorite library in the whole wide world,” Haleema said. Haleema also mentioned that Daliyah has her own library card, and is a regular at her local library.
“I like to check out books every day. And I want to teach other kids to read at an early age, too,” Daliyah said. Haleema said it was through the 1,000 Books Before Kindergarten program that she got the idea to start counting the number of books Daliyah read.
She stated that Daliyah was about 3 years old at the time, and had likely already read about 1,000 books with her help. Haleema said Daliyah has met the program’s 1,000-book goal and aims to reach 1,500 by the time she enters kindergarten.
Daliyah’s parents said they have never tested her exact reading level, but she is capable of reading books that her 10- and 12-year-old siblings bring home from school on her own, seeking help only when she gets stuck on a big word.
”Her favorite writer is Mo Willems author of the “Pigeon” and “Elephant and Piggie” series and she has a special interest in dinosaurs. She can spit out numerous facts about dinosaurs and dreams of someday digging up dinosaur fossils as a paleontologist,” Haleema said.
She stated that to really discover her love for books, she challenged Daliyah with a college-level text, a speech called “The Pleasure of Books” by William L Phelps. Daliyah learned to read the speech so well, pronouncing words such as “punctiliousness” and phrases like “annihilates formality.
Her mother posted the video of her reading the phrases on Youtube with hopes to encourage other parents to teach their children how to read at a young age. ”Exposing her children to books from infancy has made all the difference,”Haleema said.
Daliyah also
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