5 Ways to Help Your Kids Spring into Reading!
It’s finally Spring! We are all feeling renewed and ready to grow. As it relates to our kids, now more than ever, reading leads to growth! So many facets of today’s world involve what I like to call “hands-on literacy.” Children need to compute and comprehend at a rate much faster and more complex than we did. And that’s ok! It’s the 21st century and we should embrace the amazing world in which we live. We can use the fundamental ideas of reading and literacy as a base and partner for this fast paced world. How? When? Get them to sit still? Easier said than done with sports, longer daylight and the hectic pace of everyday life…believe me, I hear you. But here are 5 easy ways to get your kids to spring into reading!
1. Go to the library. It’s a magical (and free!) place. Explore it. Feel the books. Take a stack of ten off of the shelves and get cozy in a corner. Look for different genres, types, sizes…read at least one before you leave and take three home. Make this a weekly trip. Find the classics. Share them with your children. Read a Robert Frost poem. Find a Shakespeare sonnet. Look at the language and the imagery.
2. Create a journal. Choose a notebook or even staple a few sheets of paper together. This is now your official “book of books” as my mother say. Write down the titles, authors, what you liked or did not like and draw a picture of the cover or a piece of the story. Not only will you have a great memento of your reading adventures but you will also be practicing and expanding comprehension, cognition and composition skills!
3. Go outside. What could be easier? Grab your book, a snack and a blanket and find a spot to make your outside reading nook. As you journal, make observations about what you see outside. Draw pictures of different flowers or wildlife.
4. Get techy. Kids love technology. They are much further advanced than we ever were at their age. There are some really great apps that offer books, interactive books and more. These can be great for beginning readers. If you have an e-reader in your house, connect to your local library. You can download from home and your kids will love the option to choose their book that way
5. Read together. Spend time each day and just read. Put the devices away. Turn the television off. Choose some of the classics with your older readers…discover Treasure Island or Little Women. Read all of the Hardy Boys or Little House on the Prairie. Introduce them to Aesop’s fables or Hans Christian Andersen. Search for the Newberry, Caldecott and Ezra Jack Keats medal winners.
In the end, we want our children to read and keep their young minds active. Taking simple steps such as these will only foster a life-long love of reading. And if you have extra books at home, please donate them to local organizations or schools in need. A few books in the home of child without any can literally change their world!
ABOUT BETH: Beth is a reader, writer, editor, advocate, business owner and mom. She is the CEO of the startup, Page’s Corner, a children’s learning company. Beth also created the Mission Read campaign, runs the #virtualbookclub on twitter and hosts #BonBonBooks as the Editor of the Library. She is an information junkie with an obsession for seashells from the Jersey shore, secretly wishes to be JB Fletcher and loves the constant chaos of life with her two daughters! Bucket list item: to be on Sesame Street.
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