Karen Baldacci is a former kindergarten teacher.
NORWAY – Reading to the children of the Guy E. Rowe Elementary School keyed memories on Tuesday for Karen Baldacci, Maine’s first lady.
She had been a kindergarten teacher before being swept up in first lady duties, so picking up “Thidwick, The Big-Hearted Moose,” was like visiting an old friend.
She said she had read many a Dr. Seuss book while she was a teacher.
“I love reading to kids,” Baldacci said. “I miss it.”
She read three books to three different assemblies, so all the children could get a chance to spend some time with her.
She was at the school as part of a belated birthday for Dr. Seuss, beloved author of many children’s books, and as part of the Read Across America celebration.
Children asked Baldacci questions, most of them centering on her life.
She told the children that although life is busy, she gets to see more of her husband than when he was a U.S. congressman.
She told them that it is important to read and be a good listener and that people only get out of life what they put into it.
“How old are you?” one student asked.
“Well, I’m going to teach you two things about being a gentleman,” Baldacci pleasantly told the boy. “First, never ask a woman her age and never ask a woman her weight.”
Baldacci said she was heading to Otisfield Community School for an afternoon reading program and planned on reading to students in Gorham, weather permitting, on Wednesday.
First-grade teacher Melissa Fagan dressed as Seuss character Cat in the Hat and read to classes as part of the day’s celebration, and temporary Norway Postmaster Thomas Ostrowski gave the school a sheet of the new issue Dr. Seuss stamps.
Community members, including beauticians from Hair & Co., Norway town officials, Oxford Hills Chamber of Commerce members, owners of L.F. Pike & Son and retired school teachers will also be reading during the week.
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