Sending some happy sats to @anniedustan because her comments remind me that I may have some useful tips for fellow frustrated parents out there.
—- Our children are digital natives, so they are less attuned to sitting down quietly with a book and using their imagination to get into the characters’ lives. They are bombarded so much by visual and auditory stimuli that they find reading boring.
Are there ways to counter this reluctance? I have several suggestions in mind because I work as an English teacher. Maybe they will work, maybe they won’t, but the idea is to keep trying. After all, Albert Einstein himself exhorted us to “try one more time”.
1. Storyline Online
Storyline Online features actors reading aloud children’s books. It could be the right carrot to entice your child to read a book read by his/her favourite actor/actress. Oprah Winfrey, Chris Pine, Rosario Dawson, Viola Davis, Terry Crews, Connie Britton, John Lithgow, Jennifer Garner, Betty White, among others, have served on this worthwhile project.
2. Epic!
Epic! houses a great collection of fiction and non-fiction books in English, Spanish, French and Chinese. I just used it this morning so that my children could sit on my lap and listen to the audio while looking at the pictures of elephants. (My son wanted an elephant book. 🐘) Not all books have audio versions, but every book comes with a quiz that your child can attempt to check his/her understanding. There are also fun badges up for grabs, which may be useful in helping your child build good reading habits.
3. Book Creator
Why not write your own book with your children? Book Creator has an intuitive template for you to leverage. Just follow the steps and Ta-da! You and your children have churned out a book that you can truly call your own. You can even insert your photos or illustrations to personalise your book further. I wrote “Happy the Hippo” for my boy since he is crazy about hippopotamuses.
I will be interested to know how these methods work out for you and your child(ren). Never give up!
This made me smile when I woke up this morning! (of course the first thing I did was check SN😂) Thank you!
We have a long weekend here in the UK and I also have the time off to spend with the kids, so I am going to look into these ideas starting with Book Creator as this will be something really fun to do with the younger two! (I will ask the teens to get involved and get looked at like I have grown a second head 😂)
I will let you know how it goes! Thank you again - that was a very kind thing to do and I much appreciate it!
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Ya I can imagine your teens trying hard not to roll their eyes at you. Haha.
Happy holidays!
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Writing your own book with your child is an excellent idea, I wouldn't have thought of it, thank you so much for your contributions!
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I didn’t know you have kids! Boy or girl?
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A Cowboy ;)
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Nice. We are in the same boat haha
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Great advice. Thanks for sharing.
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Your kids must read a lot on their own since they always come up with obscure stuff for Fun Fact Friday haha
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My son reads quite a bit. My little girl is just learning how to read. She gets her facts from her online lessons.
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Great ideas! Thanks!
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Thanks for letting me know haha
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I love epics best type of stories
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