How Comic Books Helped Me Learn to Read

Literacy Narrative: Learning to Read with Donald Duck Comic Books

One of my earliest memories is also one of my most important. One weekend when I was about 4 years old, I recall jerking open the closet door in my bedroom (I was in a hurry to get something inside) and the bottom of the door caught the big toenail on my right foot, pealing it back and ripping it off. As the pain washed over me and I saw the blood flow, I quickly realized this was not going to end well and I started yelling and crying at the top of my lungs. My parents rushed into my room and I managed to blurt out what happened through my sobs, but a trip to the emergency room, a spiffy new bandage and lavish attention from my parents helped reassure me that everything would soon be okay – and I was right.

Not only did my mom bring me hot sweetened tea and crackers with peanut butter while I propped my foot up in bed, my dad left abruptly only to return a half hour later with a stack of used comic books which he gave me without a word except to say he hoped my toe was better soon. We never had comic books in my home before this incident, only “kiddie books” which did not particularly interest me and I was quickly intrigued by the colorful comic book covers depicting Donald Duck and his nephews, Huey, Dewey and Louie, having all kinds of exciting adventures. Armed with this comfort food and literary booty, I quickly forgot all about the pain in my toe and began to scan the comic panels closely. Although I was able to make out a few of the words, most were still just so much gibberish to me at the time but the pictures helped explain what was going on in sufficient detail to keep me interested and allow me to follow the storyline.

After “reading” all of these comic books in this fashion, I asked my parents about some of the words that I did not understand and they helped me sound out each word so I could recognize it the next time I came across it. One word in particular confounded me anyway. Donald and his nephews were stranded on a desert island for some reason or another, I recall, but even though I could see the picture I could not figure out what an “is-land” was until I got some more help.

There was no stopping me after that. My newfound love for the comic books quicky expanded to include other characters such as Little Dot and Richie Rich as well as superheroes and I eagerly read each new offering whenever I could secure a new comic. Indeed, just a few weeks after trying to read my first Donald Duck comic book with great effort, I was zipping through comic books as fast as I could lay my hands on them and learning new words every day in the process. Of course, I had my favorite superheroes including most especially Green Arrow. Although Green Arrow did not possess any superpowers per se, he was armed with his consummate skills with the bow and arrow (not to mention his snazzy gadget arrows). Likewise, Batman and Captain America lacked superpowers but still managed to defeat crime and protect the American way of life despite the odds.