Tips for Reading to Your Kids

Posted on 07 16, 2006 under The Manual by Noodad | Comments

It"s been shown that reading to your kids as early as newborn age can help with speech development, concentration, and early reading skills. But reading to a kid that early can also create an exercise in patience. Whether you have a fidgety kid or one that just ain"t interested, you need some ways to get through it. Because they may not know it is important, but you do. Here are a few things to remember when your offspring start going aggro on you and a few ways to keep their attention.

 

FINISH THE BOOK
I know it is tempting, when your kid starts looking elsewhere for entertainment, to just ditch the book. But it is important to finish the book so that they understand the story goes from start to finish. Plus, the next page might be the one to capture their attention. Besides, don"t you want to find out whether anyone finds Maisy?

POINT OUT EVERYTHING
After you read every page, make sure you point out what"s going on in the picture as well. Take care to point out the color, animal, shape, and an adjective for each object. For instance: "Look at the cute blue elephant behind the tree and the small yellow chick next to the barn." You will be surprised how quickly your kids will pick up names of animals, shapes, and colors when you do this.

READ EVERY PAGE
I have been tempted many many times to skip pages of books…especially the long ones. But that"s not sending the right message to your kids now is it? Truck through the book (even if its long): your kids are worth it.

READ UPSIDE DOWN
One way to keep you interested in a book is to make it a challenge. Try reading the book upside down. Face your kid with the book in between you (the book is right side up for them). You will find it is easier than it seems and it will keep you awake.

CHANNEL YOUR INNER AUSSIE
Even a dry book, like Runaway Bunny, can be made hilarious when you read it with a Jamaican accent. Then the next day, try an Australian one or an Indian one. Your kids will be amazed at the strange sounds coming out of your mouth.

REWRITE THE BOOK
Your kids will want to read the same books over and over again. There will be books that you will be able to recite from memory after a while. Mix things up by changing words in the book and see if your kids catch on.

With a little bit of creativity, reading can be fun for you and your kids. Any other dads out there have creative ways to keep your kids entertained with books?

 

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Viewing 4 Comments

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    I think two other things that help kids warm up to reading are:

    1. Make it part of your routine. Bedtime is the easiest way to incorporate daily reading. Do it every day. Take your kids\' favorite books on vacation with you, too. While the bedtime setting may be different, the routine can stay the same.

    2. Lead by example. If your kid sees you reading, he\'ll be more interested in reading. (Tangent: They have this feature in Sports Illustrated that\'s a grid with four or five athletes in the first column and a series of questions about current events, pop culture, etc. in the first row. It\'s supposed to show how tuned in the athletes are to what\'s going on, what\'s hip, etc. In one issue, SI asked each to name the last book he or she had read. Two of the four said \"I don\'t read books.\" Way to go!)

    The only tip above that I think should be qualified a little is finishing the book every time. I\'d say to do this only if your kid wants to finish the book every time. If not, your kid might feel like he\'s being forced into something and react negatively to it (like when you try to make them clean their plate everytime).

    Noodad is right, though. Keep it fun for both of you to get the most out of reading to your kid.

    (One more thing, if you pre-dads want to start reading to the baby before the arrival, get a copy of \"Oh, Baby, the Places You\'ll Go! A Book to be Read In Utero\" It\'s a fun book to read aloud and will bring back a lot of memories of Dr. Seuss characters and stories.)
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    My 16 month old son went through a \"phase\" where the idea of sitting on his parents\' laps for the even length of Good Night Moon just wasn\'t his idea of a good time, so for that time (a couple weeks) we just sat on the floor next to him in front of his bookshelf while he \"read\" and we read other books aloud to him. That way he still recognized it as a part of his day to engage in books, and still came to recognize the stories that he was hearing over and over and over and over and over again.
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    Not sure I agree with the advice always to finish the book. There have been plenty of times Baby A (turned 2 in June) simply wasn\'t going to sit still. Her attention was gone--and it would\'ve been silly for me to sit reading \"Froggy Searches for Shapes\" to myself.

    Another idea is to tell plenty of made-up stories, without books (or make your own with pictures from magazines). Our current favorite is \"Tiny Baby A,\" the story of me and my husband falling in love, wanting a baby, joyously welcoming A into our lives, then all the things we did to take care of her. (\"And the mommy and daddy helped their tiny baby nurse so she had a full tummy, and sang songs to her and hugged her when she cried so she\'d feel all better....\")

    She *eats it up.* I guess little kids like to hear about themselves, just like us adults.

    - L
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    Many important abilities stem from reading skill, and you\'re totally right in encouraging an early start. In all of my studies and work in schools I learned that kids with parents who read to, with, and in front of them had fewer academic problems than those for whom the converse was true.
 

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