Ready, Set, Learn Series: Karen Romano Young, Author

Marlene Barron is a brilliant, funny, creative teacher -- now head of her school -- of young children. My kids were little when I began interviewing her (picking her brain, really) about how kids can learn without being pushed too quickly into readin', writin', and arithmetic -- and how best they succeed. Marlene was so good at letting me know about the things I was doing right -- raising my kids in a "literature soup" (no surprise there) and letting them do fun, crazy, confidence-building things like "painting" the trees in the backyard with water. And she was a goldmine of ideas of activities we could do together that would be just so much fun for all of us.