Monday, August 21, 2017

The 10 year old writer - Adora Svitak

Adora Svitak is a 10 year old writer and teacher who lives in Seattle, U.S.A. She started reading by the age of three and writing by four. She has written almost 300 short stories and published a book entitled Flying Fingers on writing tips and short stories at the age of seven. She can type 70 words per minute and she reads two or three books every day. "I read so many books my parents actually had to tell me to stop reading," Adora recalls.

She explains how she does all these, which, in her words, is the "combination of encouragement, love and technology" referring to her passion for writing, her computer and the support she receives from her parents.  "My parents were always encouraging me and giving me support and constructive criticism," she says.

She never has the feeling that she is missing out on her childhood as she started working at such an early age. She says, "This is more than work to me. This is quite enjoyable to me and this is play almost in some ways. I don't really look at it so much as work."


Adora is homeschooled and she is already three years ahead of her peers following an online curriculum.

Her father is a software engineer with a PhD in physics. Her older sister Adriana, 13, is a highly talented pianist.

Her mother who was brought up in China during the Cultural Revolution says she always told the baby sitters to couch her children in a way that is inducing to the learning process.
 "Learning is essentially the same as eating and drinking and you don't stop eating and drinking. So you never stop learning."

The mother is acting as her daughter's personal manager and she says she doesn't want to bring outside people into the family equation. She says she does not put pressure on her daughter in any way. "It is not that I influence her but a lot of the time she influences me," she said. Hence, she confirms that whatever her daughter does is not necessarily to meet her expectation as a mother.

Apart from her regular reading and writing routines, Adora also teaches writing for primary school kids several days a week. She has a tight schedule of her daily activities. She already gave more than 300 talks and presentations to schools all over the country.

From a TV studio in her family's basement, Adora broadcasts public lectures nearly every day to schools all over America and she is paid 300 dollars for each lecture.

At times, Adora also pitched a deal with the corporate world such as her latest deal with Microsoft, and she received payment upto 10 thousand dollars for her contributions.

Adora hopes she will be considered among the renowned writers of world such as J. K. Rowling.
"Whatever I become I hope that maybe kids someday would tell me they want to be the next Adora Svitak. That would be very cool."

Source: Barcroft TV: The World's Cleverest Child and Me
https://youtu.be/Z32NnlIpsz8

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