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Friday, April 13, 2007
Capturing Young Readers in the Electronics Age
Teachers I talk with, as I do substitute teaching and conduct writing workshops in schools, find it challenging to keep many youngsters interested in reading. They mention that it seems fewer of them like to read…or they don’t read so much at home.
“We have to compete with TV, video games, and movies to hold their attention,” one teacher remarked to me. “I feel I have to be an entertainer.”
When assigned something to read at school, many students groan, while a few (like my granddaughter) consider this an enjoyable respite from other school work.
Parents may find the same situation at home and need to make an effort to get their children away from electronic and television games. Here are some suggestions that might help to encourage reading,
*Let children see you reading
*Read to young children
*Set aside a family reading time
*Have children read to one another
*Encourage children to act out stories
*Participate in reading programs at the local library
*See if your school has extra reading programs...like the Saturday mornings (in March) Reading Enrichment for grades K-8. Our grandkids have thoroughly enjoyed this.
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2 comments:
I absolutely agree that children need to see that parents value reading and do it themselves.
I believe a love of reading is "caught not taught".
Thanks, Yvonne, for stopping by. That's an interesting statement, "reading is 'caught not taught'." I grew up in a family of readers. Now that I think about it, my grandparents were readers and book "accumulators", my parents were readers. Fortunately my husband enjoys reading, too, so doesn't mind the numbers of books I collect. My daughter, her husband and children are readers, too. Since they live with us, our house has enough books to start a small library. And people enjoy coming to our yard sales because there are always many of those "one read" books that we're getting rid of.
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