A few nights ago I was not feeling well. Nothing major, but enough that I was gonna pass on our bedtime read for the night. My son was disappointed, but after a few minutes said, “Can I read to you instead?” I’ll be honest, I said no a couple of times at first. But he kept insisting that it was my turn to be read to, and he told me I could even choose the book–how could I turn that down?
So, out of my three choices, I picked The Mitten by Jan Brett, and below is a picture I snuck while I was getting my bedtime book.
So I’ve discovered a new occasional perk of #RaisingReaders….a break. 🙂
I learned through a recent webinar from Donalyn Miller, a strong advocate for children’s literature and motivating kids to read, that statistics show there’s a drop in interest in reading for children between 3rd and 4th grades (Scholastic 2019)…exactly where my son is. If you’ve read any of my previous posts, you know that while he’s not a struggling reader, he’s not what I would call an enthusiastic reader at all. So when you add to that this pandemic, which has shifted the reading behaviors of even the most regular readers, this mama’s concern is amplified ten-fold.
So what do I do in times like this? I latch back onto things that have worked in the past, like connecting him with books around things he enjoys. This time around it was Minecraft, since that was a new obsession this summer. And a couple of days after checking a Minecraft book from this library, I snapped this photo:
It had been quite some time since he even read before falling asleep, let alone turning on a light after I turned off his lamp. So even though he was supposed to be laying down and closing his eyes, I let him slide this time because I wanted him to be reading.
So, when you’re #RaisingReaders, if you’re worried about making sure they stay motivated and into books, go back to those methods that worked before and try them again.
Four years ago I wrote about this awesome journal I found for kids, partly in the hopes that a decade or two in the future my kids would look back on them and enjoy reading about their thoughts as kids. I was wrong. It only took them 4 years to find their initial entries hilarious.
They spent a good 45 minutes before bed CRACKING EACH OTHER UP, going through their old drawings and responses. As much as I wanted them to go to sleep (let’s be honest, I wanted to go to sleep), the sound of them 1) getting along and 2) laughing together was just enough for me to only interrupt to take their picture.
This journal has now exceeded my expectations, so I wanted to make sure I share the original blog post here, that includes where it can be purchased.
Me and audiobooks have a love/hate relationship. I love the idea of them and believe that they are the same as reading the actual book…but I am not an avid audiobook listener. I don’t have a long commute to work (with or without a pandemic) or really any sort of long stretch of time that I can listen to a book, but I’ve tried. Luckily the last two times I tried to listen to audiobooks, I actually had hard copies of the book. I can usually get about three-fourths of the way through an audiobook, and then I get real impatient, grab the book, and finish reading it myself. However, the story is very different when it comes to my children…
Both my kids are all about audiobooks, I’ve even written about our previous experiences here and here. Just this week, my daughter decided to listen to an audiobook of Echo Mountain, a book she had tried to read last month but ended up abandoning, and now she’s all about it. She told me, “I think the book was confusing, but listening to it made it better. I might go back and try to read the book again after I finish.” Listening to the book was a great way for her to read a book that she previously thought was too difficult for her.
My son is currently listening to books from the Wayside School series. He told me this evening, “I think the reason I haven’t been falling asleep as fast as I used to is because I’m listening to the book. I can’t stop listening, ’cause they’re so interesting.” Audiobooks are a great opportunity for him to reread books and really increase his comprehension.
So as much as I can’t personally find the time or patience to listen to audiobooks, they are a perfect option for my kids to read and experience more books. If you haven’t introduced your readers to audiobooks, you might want to give it a try!
Looking for something to read with your kiddos around voting or Election Day? I’ve got a great recently released book for you.
A Vote is a Powerful Thing, written by Catherine Stier and illustrated by Courtney Dawson is a great bedtime read for kids about the power of democracy. In Ms. Trask’s class, she’s teaching her students about how important voting is and has created a project for students to help get students invested in the act. Thanks to one of Ms. Trask’s students, our main character Callie, she and another student create campaigns to convince students to vote for the field trip of their choice.
Callie is particularly invested because her grandma is trying to save the same wilderness park that Callie is campaigning for. I won’t spoil the ending for you, but I will say both campaigns work hard to get their classmates to pick their choice.
The thing I really appreciated about this book was what I felt was a different type of campaign that the students ran. Usually in children’s books the students are running for class president, which is a cool idea, but in my own elementary education as both a child and teacher, I’ve never had a class president. As a result, I found those books to be a little less relatable. Voting for a field trip though? That I could see happening, which makes it that much better to connect with its readers. There’s even a couple of pages of information about voting at the end, including a timeline of voting rights in the United States. It was a winning bedtime read for us!
So if you want to introduce your kids to how democracy works, A Vote is a Powerful Thing by Catherine Stier and illustrated by Courtney Dawson is the way to go.
*I received an Advanced Reading Copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. This title was released on September 1, 2020 and can be purchased wherever books are sold.
Raising Readers... 