As parents, we know how important it is to develop the habit of reading in our kids. I am sure that those parents who are voracious readers themselves will have kids who are also into reading books.
But there are so many parents out there who are not much into reading. However, they know how important this reading habit is and they want to inculcate the same in their kids. They are clueless as to how to go about that. This article is for those parents who want their kids to be voracious readers.
The first question that arises in your mind is this: “When do I start inculcating this habit in my kid?” The answer to this is: “Right from the time they are born.” Yes, you read it right. Make reading aloud to your kid as part of your daily routine.
Here are some tips to go about it :
1. Read aloud to your kids
Don’t worry if you did not start this when your kids were born. Start it now. Kids by nature are fond of stories. They would love it if you read aloud to them. Get them hooked to stories. In the initial stage, choose stories with lots of pictures. They love to see the pictures as well.
Assuming that you are Indian parents and want your kid to start reading English books, choose books with simple English to read aloud. You may need to translate the story and narrate it in your mother tongue at the initial stage. Read each sentence with a lot of action and then translate it. Later on, when you kid is able to understand the English words, just read aloud the story slowly with a lot of facial expressions and actions.
2. Have a lot of books around
Just as you spend money getting your kids a lot of toys and dolls, invest in books too. Surround their play space with books. Don’t worry if they tear a few. Let them get accustomed to the presence of books. Slowly, they will feel motivated to browse through them. Most likely, they will come to you asking you to read out the stories in it to them.
3. Be patient
There are times that your kid gets hooked to a certain story and asks you to read it aloud again and again. Don’t lose patience. Read it as many times as they want you to. It is their way of memorizing the story to themselves. I still remember how my son used to ask me to read a certain page on trains in his book to him again and again. In a short while, he had memorized the passage and used to pretend to read it while browsing through the pictures of the train.
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4. Get books for them that are graded according to their age
Once your kid is hooked to stories and has started going to school as well, slowly he/ she will make an attempt to read the stories by himself/ herself. At this stage, be there with a ready word of praise. Don’t force your kid to read. He/ She has to do it at his/ her own pace.
5. Set aside time for reading
If your kids are like mine and are into reading so much that they neglect their school work, you may have to be a little strict in enforcing certain rules like setting the time to read. But let me tell you this. It is a losing battle. Once they are voracious readers, they find ingenious ways to trick you and somehow read books. I say this with pride of course.
Now another question arises. How does reading books help kids? What skills do they develop from reading books? Follow this space for the next part on reading.
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