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Originally Posted by silasgreenback
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Originally Posted by DMcCunney
Want kids to read for pleasure? Set an example, starting when they are very young. Kids are like the young of all species: they don't do what you say - they imitate what they see you do.
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That's the long and short of it.
When I was a boy, either of my parents were into a book at any given time and it was a behavior I wanted to emulate. My dad often had a paperback with a cover that appealed to my imagination and made me eager to move on from Little Golden Books. Because of those influences, learning to advance my reading skills wasn't a chore. |
I got convinced of the notion years back, during dinner with a group at an SF convention. The topic of declining literacy came up. I asked "How many of you had parents who
read to you when you were young?"
Every hand was raised.
Mom was a voracious reader, and read to me. Dad had been, but stopped before I was old enough to notice, and mostly confined his reading to newspapers. OTOH, he was partly responsible for my love of SF. He read SF when younger, and there were SF books lying around the house. I think the first SF I read was the Healey and McComas "Adventures in Time and Space" anthology (the second hardcover SF collection published) when I was around ten years old.
I didn't understand all of it, but the sense of wonder came through in force.
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As an aside, this topic has me wondering about the sort of influence shows like Reading Rainbow have had on kids who would otherwise not be exposed to reading at all. I'd wager that LeVar Burton has done society more of a favor than we know or could measure.
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We can certainly hope so. For too many folks, reading is a chore, done because they have to. They never learned to see it as fun, and don't do it unless required to. Anything that gives kids the idea that reading can be for pleasure is a good thing.
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Dennis