When my son was little, I went overboard. I bought every educational game I could find, I made flash cards with the 100 most frequently used words in the English language, I sang rhymes all day and for bedtime I would sing him every children's song I knew. There were a lot.

I so desperately wanted him to be a good student when he eventually went to elementary school that I even used time-outs as an excuse to get him to do academic work. Instead of having him just sit in his room quietly, I made him do an activity sheet. When he got into a lot of trouble, he would do four.

Let me make a few excuses before I go on: It was my first child. I really wanted him to succeed in life. I wanted him to have a head start and to have advantages I did not have growing up (My parents came to North America knowing only one word in English: Help!), and I wanted him to maximize on the intelligence God gave him.

Naturally, I feel guilty now, but there is one thing I'm not sure I regret: When he was six years old I started paying him to read chapter books. I gave him one dollar for each chapter he finished. A few months passed, and I started feeling silly for doing that. Here I was buying the books, lots of books so he could have a choice—and he was picky—and to top that off I was paying him to read them!

So one day, I said to myself, "That is it. I'm not doing this anymore. It's ridiculous. I am so desperate for him to become a reader (because I believe that books give you endless opportunities and  emotional and intellectual intelligence) that I am actually paying him." Something just didn't feel right about it. So I walked up to him and said, "I'm not paying you anymore. You can read if you want to, and if you don't want to, don't do it."

But—despite my thinking I went overboard and feeling guilty about bribing a child to read—today he is a voracious reader. He absolutely adores books. He needs a new one all the time, which, mind you, I do not buy anymore. We are now frequent visitors to the library.

I don't know if it's because of all the books he's read or if he would have been the way he is with or without the books, but he is a kind soon-to-be teenager. He is empathetic and extremely well spoken. The other day he wrote me a birthday card; I couldn't believe the words came from his hand. They were beautiful.

As for the kindness, when a person once knocked on our door asking for money and my ex-husband sent him away, he ran upstairs yelling, "Mommy! Mommy! There was a man at the door who needed  money and he left! Mommy!"

Well, I ran downstairs and out into the street to give the person what I could.

The marriage didn't last long after that, but my son is still reading and helping whenever he can.