For the Love of Reading

I have always loved reading. Reading a good book is like snuggling into freshly washed and straight from the dryer bedding.

And when I close that One Book, you know the one- the best book you have read that year- I experience a profound feeling of loss. And this unshakeable suspicion that I will never again read something so good. That that was the last Great Book- it was that good, and I will never find another book that even comes close.

Of course you always find another good book later, but that feeling that that was the last best book is almost like a breakup! I think I actually experience a brief period of mourning!

A love of reading is subjective. I learned this by raising three kids. My oldest son loved reading most of his childhood but fell out of it for a while starting at about 4th grade. Just never "got into" something after that and adopted the attitude that reading was a chore, perhaps due to forced reading activities. Until he discovered The Vampires Assistant when he was 12 years old. He fell in love with that book, and subsequently all of Darren Shan's work. He consumed the Vampire series like air, and keeps re-reading them every so often to this day while he is awaiting Darren's newest book.

My middle son has not found his "Darren Shan" yet. He tries, we will go to the bookstore and he will search. Sometimes he finds something promising. But nothing has stuck. I have hope :)

And my youngest. Oh my baby boy. He has the greatest imagination of us all. But he fell victim and was warped by the timer and test driven public school system.

Little Niki had a great passion for reading, and would often sit right beside me, sharing a blanket while we read our books. He consumed them so fast that he grew a vocabulary that rivaled that of college graduates by the time he left grade school.

A terribly competitive child, Nik has to be the best in everything. US schools grade children using timed sessions in grades 1-3. Several students are taken out of class and brought to a special room and seated in front of a stack of copied papers. A teacher hands each child one page and says start and begins the stopwatch. The teacher then records how many words are read per minute.

This is a real thing, I am not even joking.

So in Niki's mind, reading faster equaled reading better, and "winning".

He actually won an award for being the fastest reader in his school.

A terrible side effect resulted from this speed reading competition. Nik stopped forming pictures about the story in his head. He stopped imagining the characters and settings.

Reading became all about the competition and how fast he could go.

Worst of all was Nik stopped liking it. Reading became work.

Never make reading (in itself) a graded competition. It can have negative consequences.

I did not like this but this was before I was in a position to work at home and homeschool him. In fact, this was one of the reasons, a small one, but a reason nonetheless.

I have helped him slow down a bit, and he imagines something from time to time, but unlearning (unschooling) is a tedious process. But we do make progress, and I have faith that with the foundation he was born with will help his love of reading and imagination stand strong once again.

I had always assumed my boys would acquire my deep love of reading naturally. I read them stories every night before bed from the time they were born. Gifted them with choices from the local bookstore. And I suppose deep down I believed it was passed down from my DNA as my Grandpa taught me to read at a super young age.

I believe even those who do not love to read can, IF they find the right book. Something they can relate to, something that engages them and sparks that fire that I cannot imagine living without :)

Let Them Choose

This is easy if you homeschool or are teaching reading to your own children. Take them to the bookstore or library and let them choose the books they want. Do not force them to read anything! My good friend used to enjoy reading until High School when they made him read Romeo and Juliet. He was full of hormones and absolutely abhorred being forced to read something his adolescent Ego determined was fluffy and not worthy of his newly found manhood.

If you have a class of students, they can still have a choice but you have to be strategic about it as not everyone will want to read the same thing. You can offer several choices and take a vote, perhaps reading the second choice book after the winning choice.

Don't Judge a Book by its Cover!

Have your child read a few pages before deciding to purchase. Kids are guilty of choosing books based on how cool the cover looks. What I like to do for myself even, is flip to a random page somewhere in the middle and start there. The first pages are going to be good- they have to grab the potential buyers attention! If the stuff in the middle is good, then I know I will like it.

Make it Fun and Draw it Out

Yea, really! Draw it out! The kids can draw scenes from the book you are reading. Do something related to the book, outside of the book.

For instance, if the characters in the book live by a zoo, take a field trip to the zoo. If there is a scene where they take a train ride, do so as a family. If it's a class, you can visit the train station, or look up your local rail yard on a map and follow the tracks to see all the places the trains can travel.

Offer books as rewards
If your child must read something they do not want, make them a deal- you will too! Have them choose a book for you! You never know, you might find a new love :)
Create a comfy place to read. My oldest sons kindergarten class had cool, hidden nooks with large pillows. There was even a hammock! Make sure there is plenty of good light- natural is best.
Get their eyes checked. If a child has trouble seeing, they will never love to read because it will cause physical pain in the form of headaches.
Read everything and mix genres and fiction and nonfiction.
Keep a dictionary handy. If you do not know a word, you will not retain the entire sentence or idea.
Learn about the author and discuss him or her and their life. You might find other books by that same writer.