How to Get Your Child to Read More

I tell my child to read more, but they just don't do it!

I hear that a lot from parents, and I understand their concern. Reading is the single best way for kids to learn about our world. First you learn to read, then you read to learn. Say what you will about traditional school and its never-ending parade of reading passages and multiple choice questions, but it's where we pick up a lot of the little tidbits that we call "common knowledge", from famous people, to animal eating habits, to past civilizations, to astronomical bodies. This is knowledge that simply being "smart" can't get you. Einstein himself couldn't know the details of a historical event he'd never learned or a book he'd never read. And for a child to learn everything they need to know, they need to do a whole lot more reading than anyone could possibly do with them. So, they gotta read, a lot, by themselves.

How to accomplish this? Well, honestly, reading, a lot, by themselves is the end goal, but getting there does require some legwork on the part of the interested adults in their lives. Here are some things to consider before you tell a child to "read more":

1. Do the adults in the child's life read? Does reading feel built into the normal goings-on of the household? If not, consider that the non-reading child is just a chip off the old block. Kids do what adults do. How can you help normalize reading as a common and natural activity in the home?

2. Does the child have time to read? Busy schedules can easily suck all the time and energy away from reading. And until kids like to read, you absolutely cannot expect a child to read for fun in their downtime. They'll do anything but read.

3. Is the child good at reading alone? Until a child is proficient, reading feels like work, work that some kids just don't naturally cotton to the same way that some kids just aren't naturally interested in pushing their bodies athletically. There are also some kids who don't enjoy the solitary nature of book-reading and prefer collective experiences.

4. Does the child have access to lots of books? The best way to give them access is by taking them to the local library, ideally once a week. Lots of free books there to choose from. Let them run wild in the racks.

5. Does the child have exposure to books? Exposure is when adults in their lives put books in their hands. Teachers do it by assigning books or giving them a list of titles to choose from. The other adults in their lives can do it by putting specific books in kids' hands and saying, "here, I got you this."

6. Does the child have an interested party who asks about what they're reading and engages in thoughtful conversation about books without quizzing, harassing, or otherwise sucking the fun out of the reading experience?

As I look back at the list, I notice that when kids don't read a lot on their own, there is strong evidence that it's not their fault, and changing the situation requires concerted, prolonged effort on the part of the adults in the kids' lives. So now, here is what I recommend to get your kids to read more, eventually on their own:

1. Go to the library regularly. Let the kids pick out whatever they want. Don't expect them to read everything or finish everything they pick up.

2. Make reading a natural part of family life. When you go places, take books to pass the time, and read them together if the child likes that. De-normalize phones and IPads..for everyone. (See, see how you might have helped create this problem?) Set aside family time for reading together. Ask your child to read to you while you cook or complete other hands-on, minds-off activities. Reinstate the nightly book before bed. Listen to books on tape in the car (lots of us get sick when we read in the car.)

3. Here's how to read together: Sit side by side and do the old "You read this side, I read that side", and alternate pages, reading whichever page is closest to you. Do this a lot because reading with them fixes a lot of problems: you know the reading gets done; the child has an experienced adult voice to learn proper reading cadence from, help pronounce the hard words, and answer any questions that come up; the collective experience feels good to kids who like that.

4. Look at lists of books together, discuss choices, and pick one at a time to read. Shoot for a variety of old books (from before 1900), classics, self-help/nonfiction informational, current award-winners, and what is popular with kids right now. Then put reading time on your schedule, and follow through.

   
   

   Be patient, be consistent, and you can end up with a child who likes to read and does it on their own. And in the meantime, they're getting the reading practice and banking the world knowledge they really need. Once you start, it doesn't take long to start seeing results. 

   
   

   Let me tell you about two students I've worked with recently:

   
   

   One is a 7th grade boy who's not inclined to read on his own, and when he does, it's rereading Diary of a Wimpy Kid (not bashing DWK, but kids rereading the same books multiple times is a big sign they could use some access and, particularly, exposure to new reading materials). I started holding our lessons at a local library and casually engaging him in interested conversation about his goals and interests. Turns out he enjoys fighting and war topics, and he wants to make the baseball team but doesn't want his parents to have to pay for coaching. So I found him a stack of baseball techniques books to look through, and he ended up taking home a coaches' guide to teaching youth baseball and carrying it around everywhere for weeks. And I read The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien with him, and he just ate it up! He seems genuinely excited to meet at the library next week to look through their collection of war books together so we can choose another.

   
   

   Another recent student is a 6th grade girl who recognizes that reading a variety of books is good for her, and in fact has access to lots of wonderful books, a trove of classics, in her home library provided by her enterprising parents. The trouble? Her parents read those classics in their native language, not English. So here I am, taking 30 minutes of our weekly lessons to read Great Expectations (her choice) with her, and yes it's slow going. We stop often to answer her questions or explain historical context. But I am shocked at how quickly she's improving at pronouncing new words, becoming a more confident reader, and reducing the time it takes to complete ISEE reading/multiple choice passages (the original reason for our tutoring sessions).

   
   

   I believe in the power of reading to build young minds, and I believe that when kids aren't naturally inclined to read on their own, the adults in their lives have the power to change that. Looking back, some of the most meaningful work, the stuff kids talk about when they write their college applications essays about me, comes from the time we spent just sitting and reading together.

   
   

   Have any reading dilemmas you'd like me to solve? Contact me!

   Lisa.Walter.Tutor@gmail.com

   281-352-2863