Pain-Free Steps To Grow a Book- Loving Child

I am an ex-homeschool-parent as well as a children’s book writer. I have an education degree among others.

With the necessity for learning at home at this COVID time, I’m seeing a lot of anxiety when it comes to children learning to read. So a few thoughts and Ws.

Where

Let’s start with basics. The above photo, for instance. The advantage to learning at home is that it can be a comfortable and inviting space. Your child can choose a favorite place, just for reading.

Wise teachers often have special days designated as reading days when children can bring treasured blankets, pillows, stuffies, and books, and then spread out over the classroom for reading time. I have yet to meet a child who did not enjoy this break from learning-at-the-desk. “Home” lends itself to such times.

And — it should go without saying, but given the number of homes I’ve seen with no books in them — there should be books in your home! In plain sight. On shelves, but also on tables. Maybe a stack in front of the television. Books that adults in the home read, and for all ages of children. Books for beginning readers. Books with amazing and inviting covers and illustrations. If you can’t afford such books, then go to the library. If your library is not open, scour the neighborhood for “mini-libraries” — those little wonders that are popping up all over. If you can’t find one, create one, and post a list of what you are looking to share. Ask friends. Post your needs on facebook.

Photo courtesy of author

When

If homeschooling, do not relegate “reading” to school hours. Open the day to this amazing pastime. Read before going to sleep. Find uplifting and exciting words to read in the morning. Read after so-called “school hours,” so that the child can absorb the idea that this is “fun.” (Ideally, all learning should be — if not “fun,” then enlivening.) Of course, if open to it, then do incorporate into the 9–3.

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Do not exhaust. Pick up the book yourself and read aloud with enjoyment and a sense of sharing.

What

Here’s the big one: what to read. And this is mostly for the parent who is struggling and the child who is reluctant.

For the very reluctant reader, start with picture books that have no text. Seriously. A book like Raymond Brigg’s The Snowman, for instance. Or Paul Fleischman and Kevin Hawke’s Sidewalk Circus. You can look up lists of “wordless picture books.”

These develop “visual literacy,” and will cause the young reader to get caught up in story, and feel some mastery.

Next, find books with few words. Something like On My Walk, by Kari-Lynn Winters, has about 70 words. And then there all the amazing early readers by Cynthia Rylant; her Henry and Mudge series, for example. Or Mr. Putter and Tabby. Gentle series that celebrate life and human connections. These type of books are called “early readers” for good reason. The vocabulary is straight forward, there are no contractions, the stories are short but complete. There are colored illustration and lots of white space around the text. White space means room to think and absorb, for a young reader.

In your library you can also find many collections of children’s poetry. Again, with poetry, there is a lot of white space on the page. My son, a most reluctant reader, fell in love with reading via a collection of baseball poetry and Captain Underpants. Always consider your child’s interests and passions.

Who and Why

You know why. But to consider: learning to read is not jumping through an educational hoop.

Regardless of what else is in our modern lives, reading has much to offer. There are the pragmatic pieces — reading a recipe, or the instructions given with a prescription, or warning labels.

And there will always be the nature of literature, which is not something that can be replicated by cinematic story-telling: within the simple black markings on the white page, writing and reading is the only way we have to glimpse what humans are about…deep in their very beings.

That story-telling piece of “inner monologue” exists in no other art form. And we need it, to learn about each other, and ourselves, too.

Reading — especially good fiction — is a path to learning human truths, and even to “rehearsing” possibilities in life, pieces that can guide us in future.

And too, there is the personal nature of reading, the one-on-one. It is a private act — again, unlike any other art form.

Closing note on that anxiety

I never went to kindergarten, and started school at almost 7.5 years of age; I remember it as painless. In my case, I believe that the timing was simply right. (Note that schooling in Finland begins at age seven.) On the first day of school, I learned the letter A, and colored an apple. Weeks later — it seemed to me — I was reading. By second grade I was getting in trouble for pulling books off the grade seven shelf in the school library.

John Holt, a force in education, would agree that a later start is in fact a positive (unless learning to read is ‘child-led’). Up to, and including, age nine, he thought was within the range of “don’t-worry-about-it.”

Life is made so much richer for reading. Share this joy with your child.

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This post was previously published on Medium.com.

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