Reading may be a compulsion for a school going child, but it is a pleasure for this four-year-old bookworm Daliyah Marie Arana. Daliyah, a child prodigy has read more than 1000 books even before celebrating her fifth birthday.
Before she was born, her mother Haleema Arana would read stories to her elder brother and sister. Growing up, she listened to her brother reading chapters of books out loud. By the time she was 18 months old, she had started recognising the words that her mother would read to her.
At two years and 11 months, she read her first book, all on her own. Now 4-years-old, Daliyah has read more than 1000 books.
She recently completed the Georgia 1,000 Books Before Kindergarten Program, which challenges kids to read 1000 books before their first day of Kindergarten.
Her mother counted the numbers of book Daliyah read, and when she was about three years old, she had likely read about 1,000 books and aims to reach 1,500 before she enters kindergarten next year, as reported by Independent.
Daliyah is skilled in reading and is very passionate about literature. Impressed by her passion, the leader of the Nation’s Library, Carla Hayden hosted Daliyah at the Library of Congress as ‘Librarian for the day’ granting her wish to be a librarian. Of course, she is no newcomer to the library. In fact, she has her library card and is also a regular at Hall County Library in Gainesville, Florida. According to Daliyah’s mother, Library of Congress is her most favourite library in the world.
It was fun to have 4-year-old Daliyah Marie Arana of Gainesville, GA as "Librarian For The Day." She's already read more than a 1,000 books. pic.twitter.com/MQfwlUrakO
— Carla Hayden (@LibnOfCongress) January 11, 2017
“I like to check out books every day and want to teach other kids to read at an early age,” says Daliyah, to the Gainesville Times.
Daliyah seeks help from her parents when she gets stuck on big words. Her favourite author is Mo Willems who has written “Pigeon and Elephant”.
She is fond of “Piggie” series and has a special interest in Dinosaurs. She knows a lot of facts about dinosaurs and dreams of digging dinosaur fossils like a palaeontologist.
Catering her love for books – her mother gave her college-level text speech called “The Pleasure of Books” written by William L Phelps. She also uploads her daughter’s videos on social media to encourage parents to help children develop their reading habits.
Daliyah’s father speaks to her in Spanish. Although she cannot speak the language fluently, she understands many words and hopes to work towards learning Spanish.