Sit down with a fresh glass of lemonade and read something compelling
Welcome to Fresh Lemonade. The purpose of this website is to help you find something that you will enjoy reading.
As a a foreign-language teacher for the better part of 25 years, and an avid reader for a lot longer than that, I strongly believe in the value of reading. In the 1990s, when I was working towards my TESOL (Teaching English as a Second Language) certificate, I first heard about the linguist Stephen Krashen. Professor Krashen is one of the most influential linguists of the past 50 years. He has also become something of an evangelist for Free Voluntary Reading, which is essentially reading for pleasure for the purpose of improving one’s foreign language abilities.
In nearly 25 years of teaching, I have seen first hand that students who read regularly have larger vocabularies, which helps them to understand both written and spoken English more easily. Moreover, avid readers are able to speak and write better, as well. This is why, for many, many years, I have suggested to my students that they make reading a habit.
Finding stuff to read is easy in this day and age. Of course it can be challenging to find stuff that you like. That’s why I have created this site. Currently, you can find classics such as Tom Sawyer, The Time Machine, The Great Gatsby, Pride and Prejudice, and other works, all in the public domain, and all cost-free to download as e-books or in PDF. The aim of this website, you see, is not to sell anything, but, quite simply, to promote reading.
Fresh Lemonade is a new project for me, and it is a work in progress; but over time I expect to add book reviews, as well as some original short stories and creative non-fiction. Audio books would also be interesting. By the way, in case you’re wondering about the name of the site, well, after all, what’s in a name?
