This Summer's Reading Controversy
Update: In light of Siobhan's excellent point above, I'm going to delete the top third of my post and just leave the important bit:Teaching definitely changed the way I recommend books. Kristoff's list may have put me off recommending together. So here's my advice to parents who want to make sure their kids have some fun reading this summer:
1. Go to the library.
2. Let your kids loose (age-appropriately, of course).
2a. Do not hover.
2b. No matter how old your child is, do not send them back to the shelves with "oh, you've already read that one--pick something else." Some of us like to re-read.
2c. Do not under any circumstances say to your child, "oh, that one's too easy/hard/popular/controversial for you--pick something else." (If your kid wants to read a book that makes you nervous, you can read it too, or even just invite them to tell you about it.)
3. You may check out the books that you loved as a child, but if the kid isn't into it, DO NOT FORCE ANYTHING.
4. Plan for some reading time after the library. Go to the park or out for ice cream, or even home to the air conditioning, and give everyone a couple of hours to read their library books.
4a. EVERYONE reads. That means if your kids are reading independently, so are you.
5. Repeat step 4 as often as possible between library visits.
6. If you're going away on vacation this year, make picking out vacation books as important a part of the process as buying swimsuits and sunscreen.
What are your tips for raising readers?
--Kathryne
posted by Kathryne B Alfred at 8:05 AM
12 Comments:
Lead by example. Show them that you read too. And not just books - newspapers, magazines, letters etc etc.
How to raise readers? Read! Parents must read for pleasure or kids will not - just like eating vegetables :)
Also, spend lots of relaxed time around books and other reading material - heck even cereal boxes can be interesting.
My sister is having the same problem with her two daughters (10 and 11 years old.) They both like books and never leave home without one, but only graphic novels, especially NARUTO. They have summer reading lists (which don't include any graphic novels) and trying to get them to read a "regular" book is like torture!
We're trying to explain to them that it's okay to read graphic novels, but we (and the school) would like them to read other books as well. But they keep making arguments for why graphic novels ARE real novels, etc. etc.
I'm all for letting kids read what they want. I want my nieces to love books as much as my sister and I always did -- and still do. But I can't figure out how to bridge them from only reading graphic novels to reading the kind of books they're going to have to read in school. How do we get them to love THOSE books, too???
So frustrating...
Claire and Mary G, parents reading is probably the big factor! That's why I think it's so important that EVERYBODY comes home from the library with books and EVERYBODY sits down to read them--not the kids sit down to read and Mom goes off to catch up on work e-mails.
Coe, youch. Talk about the irresistible force meets the immoveable object. Have the girls ever said what they don't like about non-graphic novel books?
Read to them. Every night. As soon as they're old enough to focus on the pictures and until they're old enough to tell you to get lost. My dad did this, and at the time I loved it because it was time with my dad, but I've been a bookaholic ever since.
P.S. - and he didn't force The Hobbit on me, he read Chicken Licken approximately 2 million and 7 times. Because that was the one I liked.
I agree with the not hovering thing. My favorite thing was my Dad used to grab a newspaper in the waiting room and sit and read patiently until I came up with my arms full with as many books as I could carry (the limit being that...I was very skilled at huge piles at a very young age). The kid's attention span isn't that long, plan an hour or 2 to spend at the library. If you don't love the library, just think of it as saving money on your electricity bill since your AC isn't on while you are there.
Graphic novel problems: I teach in Korea and while my kids love graphic novels they also love using their imagination but can be a bit lazy. Maybe suggest books with really wild imagery or with situations (magic/Japan/whatever) in novel or even nonfiction form.
Kids, whether they admit it or not think that everything you do is super cool. If you read, they read. End of story.
Coe, do your nieces like any movies that are based on books? That may serve as a bridge between a graphic story and non-graphic book, if that makes any sense. One technique I used to get my older daughter interested in moving beyond Goosebumps was to buy books I thought she might like and read them myself with obvious pleasure. When she asked, I would tell her what I liked about them. Then I would leave them lying around the house. No pressure at all since she is a little contrarian. Sometimes it would take weeks or even months, but my daughter ended up at least trying most of the books I had read.
Linking books with regular activities is a great way to encourage reading as well. Read 'If You Give a Pig a Pancake' and make some pancakes! When things are made concrete, kids tend to make more connections.
If you can, also include a frequent trip to the bookstore. Owning books, having your own books, on your own shelves, is a big part of raising readers.
Also, Coe, it might help in your situation. When I was going through my Christopher Pike phase, my mother finally said she wasn't going to buy me any more unless I read at least 2 books of what she deemed "higher quality reading." I could still read them. I could check them out from the library or buy them with my own money, but she wasn't spending any more of her money on them.
So, I still read them all the time, but the next trip to the bookstore I got something else and read that, too. After that, I still devoured Christopher Pike books, but I read other authors as well.
Worth a shot!
Fantastic! Get this list of things to do in a library and paste it everywhere you can. As a librarian I have watched in agony for 1/4 centuary as parents have done library visits sooooo badly. Now a parent myself, the library visit is just madness with a ton of weird wonderful and ridculously out of age books. You know what, my son loves it, reads like a grown up and even if he cant understand things, he is learning words, sentence structure, looks at pictures and asks a million questions. It is hard not to force your opinions on your children but gentle guidance and sneeking in my picks works well. Love this post.
Just leaving an overseas post. Hard to get books other than Amazon and Barnes (yes we are the lucky ones.)
Mine are readers, but one reluctant and the other voracious.
The reluctant one I have learned not to force or pry. I suggest stuff that I like and she might...
btw she loved Alex Rider, sorry.
But her favorites have been City of Ember (long before the movie),
Chasing Vermeer, and now Great Expectations, which she loathed HAVING to read, and basically concluded that she was the only one who really read it in the class. But now she will try more things. The summer assignment for her new school is the first part of To Kill a Mockingbird. I am thrilled that she is learning I have decent taste, and I am thrilled we'll be back to a REAL library where she can go dig.
My biggest suggestion to all is to read aloud books for the whole family. To share the books which are above their reading level, but still are exciting. For those of us with older children, it was Harry.
Now on to more books.
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