Thanks Lucy the Literacy Lady for sharing this information on LinkedIn. This is a start in the right direction! http://www.linkedin.com/groups/NJ-Assembly-approves-bills-aid-3936762.S.240565194?view=&gid=3936762&type=member&item=240565194&trk=eml-anet_dig-b_nd-pst_ttle-cn
Student A reads 20 minutes five nights every week
Student B reads only 5 minutes a night (or not at all)
20 minutes/night x 5 times each week = 100 minutes
5 minutes/night x 5 times a week = 25 minutes
100 minutes/week x 52 weeks/year (yes, during the summer, too!) = 5,200 minutes a year
25 minutes/week x 52 weeks/year = 1,300 minutes a year
Student A practices reading the equivalent of 14 whole school days a year
Student B gets the equivalent of only 3.6 school days of reading practice
From 1st to 6th grade, if these students maintain the same reading habits:
Student A will have read the equivalent of 84 school days
Student B will have read the equivalent of only 21.6 school days
The gap of information retained between students A and B will have widened considerably and so,
undoubtedly, will school performance.
How do you think Student B will feel about him/herself as a student?
Which student will likely read better?
Which will probably have greater knowledge?
Who will develop stronger study habits?
Whom would you expect to be a better writer?
Which student will have a better vocabulary?
Whom do you think will be more successful in school?
Who will most likely be a lifelong reader?
Make a love of reading your most important education goal for your children.
Make reading a daily activity
Take outings to the bookstore
Give books as gifts
Encourage them to read a book series
Encourage and participate in library use
Have a wide variety of books on hand, as well as newspapers, magazines and comics
Surprise your children with books about their favorite animal, hobby or passion
Join the Book of the Month Club so they get a new book every month
Create their own personal library in their rooms on their own bookshelves
Make reading a scheduled activity, just like clubs and sports
Try reading plays aloud (and acting them out)
Have a quiet, comfortable reading area in your home, the most comfortable room in the house
Dads, spend time reading with your kids
Keep books and magazines in the car
Don’t make your kids turn the lights out at night – let them stay up and read!
Only own one television, and never put it in your children’s room
Cancel your cable subscription and buy books instead
Don’t force them to read something they don’t like
Send teenagers to the bookstore with money to buy any book they like
Read a book together at the same time and discuss it; a kind of “family book club”
Yes, audio books can be something else we can pull out of our bag of “tricks” to help our reluctant readers. But they’re not tricks, really – just ways we want to help them discover the joy of reading that will hopefully last a lifetime.
Here are a couple of ways to use audiobooks to get your sons and daughters interested in reading:
Pair Books with Unabridged Audio Books: Look for both formats at your library or bookstore, then experiment and choose the best strategy that works for your child:
Follow the book as the audio book plays. This helps with word recognition and awareness of phrasing; or
Listen to a chapter, and then read it. This helps students understand main ideas before they are read, which can improve fluency; or
Read a chapter and then listen to it to self-check for understanding.
Create Their Own Books on Tape: Make your children the stars of their own audio books! Have them read into a tape recorder. During playback, help them follow along in the book and help identify errors. You can stop the tape and demonstrate correct words and phrases. Some research has indicated that as your children listen to themselves and hear their own reading growing better, their skills will likely improve. Reward children for the errors they find and correct as well as for their successes.
Every other month Rosalie Powell of Tulare County, California counts out nearly 1,000 children’s books to donate around the county. She would do it more often if she had the resources.
Powell has volunteered for nearly 17 years with Read for Life, an all-volunteer nonprofit with two primary goals — provide books for babies and children and to educate parents about the importance of reading to their children.
Read more at….http://www.visaliatimesdelta.com/article/20120424/PARENTING/304240002
1. One of the surest ways to get kids to read is to lead them to books and magazines related to their interests.
2. Promote reading as a social experience, something they can do with parents, siblings and friends. As noted in a previous post, having your son or daughter join or from a book club is a fun way to share reading with others, and keep them motivated to read.
3. Reading aloud to your children shouldn’t stop when they learn to read on their own; continue the practice throughout elementary school. It’s a wonderful way to stay close to your kids, and impresses on them the importance – and enjoyment – of reading.
4. There are so many ways to read today: online, e-readers, notebook computers, smartphones, iPads and more. If “old-fashioned” printed books don’t appeal to your child, technology might.
5. Practice what you preach! If you want your children to read, be sure they see you reading – often. Talk with them about what you like to read, and get them talking abouty what they might like to read about.
6. You can get your child to do more reading by “hiding” it behind other activities, such as asking them to read historic landmarkers while traveling, or looking up interesting facts online or in encyclopedias (remember those?!)
7. Help your children find books that are challenging, but not too challenging. Kids often get frustrated and turned off to reading when they encounter books that are just too difficult. An appropriately challenging book is one in which she can fluently read about 95% of the words. Keep in mind that encountering unfamiliar words will help children enhance their reading skills.
WHAT HOOKS RELUCTANT READERS?
HUMOR: Kids love to laugh and be goofy, so a good place to start reluctant readers is laugh-out-loud funny books.
SYMPATHETIC CHARACTERS: Whatever genre the story, the main character must be someone the reader can empathize, sympathize or identify with.
CONCISE, “PUNCHY’ PROSE: Reluctant readers won’t slog through lengthy or convoluted text.
FANTASY: Kids love to ask “what if?” Alternate worlds, magical happenings, and aliens capture reluctant readers’ imaginations.
ACTION: With ever-growing competition from TV and video games, books must hit the ground running, with every page propelling the reader to the next.
SUSPENSE: A book that promises something will happen early on will keep kids reading, the same way it does for adults.
SERIES: Series provide familiar characters in a familiar world that may be easier to keep reluctant readers reading.
STRONG VISUALS: Graphic novels and comic books will grab their attention – especially boys and ESL readers.
STARTING A BOOK CLUB FOR BOYS
Boys age nine and older often read well, but prefer more action-oriented activities. Though they can read, some boys still choose not to read. Hosting a book club “marries” reading with activity by motivating boys to start and finish books as they meet the challenge of a deadline.
Talk with your son(s) about starting a book club made up of friends from the neighborhood, school, church, sports teams, as well as cousins and siblings his age. You probably want to initially limit the number of members to about 6-7 including your son, but invite more than that because not all will join.
When, where and how often should his book club meet?
You could always meet at the same place – your son’s house – or you could rotate homes with each meeting. Determine a day and time, probably right after school, or on a Saturday morning – although the latter might interfere with household chores, sports and other weekend activities. Whatever you choose, be consistent and keep it to a set time period, about 1-1/2 to 2 hours.
Given the number of activities in kids’ lives these days, meeting more than once a month may be difficult. Plus, it gives boys an entire month to read the book. If they want to get together more frequently, great – as long as everyone agrees.
What are they going to read?
One thing to remember about any reading program you get your son involved in, whether his own book club or activities through church or school: it doesn’t matter what he reads, so long as he reads! Online are a number of recommended reading lists for girls and boys of all ages, general as well as genre-specific. You can also ask your son’s teacher for suggestions.
At the end of each meeting, introduce the next book and give a copy to each boy in the group. Don’t quash their enthusiasm by having to wait until they get to the library or the bookstore. If the book has been made into a movie, you could watch its trailer; if not, read the back cover summary and talk about it for a few minutes. Ask boys what they already know about the book’s premise to be sure the subject is somewhat familiar and/or one they’ll be interested in.
Another fun idea is a book and movie club – boys who like movies will be able to connect with the characters, the plot, and the setting, and reading the book helps them expand on the adventure of the movie. For more ideas, go to www.pondpunkies.com
If you have boys, it probably comes as no surprise to you that they read less than girls, and tend to score lower than girls on standardized reading tests. You know that your son has things he finds far more interesting than actually reading a book. He never asks for a book, and often complains bitterly about the ones assigned at school. In fact, he tells you he’d rather die than read such classics as Tom Sawyer or even contemporary books like Diary of a Wimpy Kid.
If you have a son who is reluctant to read, here are a few tips to help generate his interest, here’s how you can kick-start a love (or at least like!) of reading:
Make reading useful, fun and/or funny: “Any boy can and will get excited about reading, if you make it useful, fun, and funny,” says John Scieszka, author of The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales and founder of the popular Web site GuysRead.com.”Boys like to read for a purpose, to find out how to do things, like how to build a dirt bike or skateboard.”
Start with what he loves. “Kids will read when you focus on what they love,” according to Lisa Von Drasek, head children’s librarian at Bank Street College of Education in New York City. “If {he’s} a sports kid, I’m going to do my darnedest to find a book about a sport that kid loves.”
Humor is underrated on school reading lists, but boys love it, says Sciezska, whose own hit, The Stinky Cheese Man, is a playful book that pokes fun at classic fairy tales. “Calvin and Hobbes, Lemony Snicket, those books get them excited about reading, because it’s fun.”
Be a role model for reading. Studies show that when parents read and have books around, both boys and girls are more likely to be readers.
Give your boy a book. Choose one that’s related to a hobby, an interest, or is just fun.
Don’t give up! “Sooner or later…. you can hook any child on reading. It’s all a matter of patience,” says Von Drasek.
{Source: Scholastic.com}
WHAT IS A RELUCTANT READER?
There is no universally accepted definition of the term “reluctant reader” as the reasons vary widely as to why children (most typically boys) are or become reluctant readers: limited prior learning experiences, low self-esteem, stumbling blocks to their growth as readers and more.
The preponderance of electronic gadgets designed to entertain children, from video games to smart phones, plus scores of TV channels aimed at young viewers, plus the entertainment available on the Internet, means that many children choose to spend their leisure time doing everything BUT reading.
Educators and others who have been studying the phenomenon in recent years have categorized reluctant readers into a few broad categories:
Children who are intelligent and interested in reading, but don’t read well;
Children who seem to have no interest in reading and, as a result of not reading regularly, are falling or falling behind in school;
Children with specific learning problems that impede their ability, and willingness, to read;
Perhaps the most frustrating, for parents as well as teachers, is the child who reads well but has little interest in doing so. {Elizabeth Kennedy, “Resources for Reluctant Readers”}
Do you have a reluctant reader in your family or your classroom? We’ll be exploring the challenges of working with reluctant readers, and ways to help you encourage and teach them to become enthusiastic, excited readers. Check back often, and please share your stories and questions about your own reluctant readers.