We all know that literacy is an important thing. How do I encourage my
child to read? I've called in an expert for Live On Purpose TV today.
So this is my friend, Dave Stone, he is an educator, he's a reading specialist so for this
particular topic, how do I encourage my child to read?
Well you're the guy, so thanks for being here. - Sure thing. - Dave, where do you
start? - Well for the very beginning, you've got to be the reader I mean, you're
not reading why would they read? - So set the example basically. - Right and it can
be anything, it can be Fancy Nancy, it can be picture books, just reading out loud
to the child is really what's going to get them interested in what's happening
on a page. - And starting when they're really young too, right? So you don't
wait until kindergarten or first grade. Oh, I should probably start teaching my
child to read, right? So you're modeling this from a very early age. How early
can you start reading to your kids? - There is no too early. - There is no too early. - You're
giving them an example of how to say words, how to match the words to the
pictures, they're watching everything that you do and listening to everything
you do until they understand how to do it. - So you're introducing this concept
before they could ever hope to actually read? - Right. - They're getting familiar with
the context of reading in the patter. That word patter, we take on a
different timing and an expression when we're reading and kids
notice that, don't they? - They do. It's different from when we just talk, it's
different from what you're telling them what happened in the day. - Right, okay, so
we're going to start by modeling it, reading out loud to our kids when they
are young, starting early, okay. Awesome. Where would you take us from
there? - So when they realize that they like books, go to the library and have
them find the books that they're interested in and that could happen when
they're four or five years old, dinosaurs, trucks, dancing, anything that
they're interested and let them choose. - Library, that's
old school. - Totally. My favorite. - Did you guys know that they still have these?
It's actually a building in your town that houses books. - and magazines and
audiobooks - and most of them have a children's section and they put the
shelves way down low and they've got these colorful covers and they usually
have a little harder kind of a cover for these kids. - And everything is
organized so that they know this is where the nonfiction is, this is where
whatever it is that they're interested in and there's a library specialist
there that knows, oh, you're looking for this book, it's over in this area. - Yes, so
you're suggesting actually get yourself physically down to the library - to look
for things. - Now can I just make a comment here, it is so convenient with our
tablets and our smartphones to hand this to our child and they have these
apps for the kids that are very engaging and they like them and I
don't have anything against those, I think that they're awesome, what we're
talking about here is a whole different skill set, a whole different skill set
from running an app. - Sure, searching, walking around, looking for what they're
familiar with, looking for where their teacher has at school, looking at what
you have read in the past and it's okay to reread all those things, it's okay to
find new things, don't stop, let them find whatever they want to read. - So I'm not
saying get your kid off of the app or the tablet, except I kind of am
suggesting that you do that for a minute or two, for a half-hour to go down to the
Public Library and actually have a different kind of an experience.
I had an interview on my podcast, Live On Purpose Radio, with a
person who it enlightened me a little bit about literacy rates and how they
use literacy rates to predict the need for prison beds. - I've read some similar
studies and it just, it opened my eyes to the fact that look, we've got a skill set
here and I said old school, okay, because reading a book is the old way to
do it, right? It's old school but this literacy, you think about the skill
of reading and how that comes into play for almost every aspect of life. Reading
the instructions on a box of macaroni and cheese you know, you got to be able
to read some stuff, right? - Even the simple things exactly. - Cool, okay. I like where
this is going. Talk for a minute about how you honor
your child and their wishes because you have interests, your child has interests,
they may be different interests, right? - Yeah. - How do you bridge that gap?
What are you thoughts? - I don't know. I think you know what your child is interested, you know what
they talk about. If they're talking about Minecraft all the time, there's nothing
wrong with reading minecraft the whole time. - There are books about Minecraft. - How
to and story mode and a lot of different things. I mean, there's nothing wrong with
diary. I know if it's okay to mention all these different titles but sometimes
we'll look at these titles and think, oh, this is dumb reading, this is the stuff
that.. my kid's smarter than this. It's okay to enjoy those fun stories, practicing
the skill of reading because eventually they'll be done with the Diary of a
Wimpy Kid and move on to - Captain Underpants. - Right. More classic,
something that is something that you love to read and you can introduce a
story to the child that you love a book that you loved when you were in first or
second grade and it's okay that they don't like it, it's okay that it's
still on the shelf because maybe someday they'll try it. - That's great to share
with them though too because well, let's go back to your first suggestion, read
out loud to your kids, pick a story that you loved as a young person and
read that out loud to them and at the same time you get to share your
experience in your history with your child and the
enthusiasm, right. - It matters that you care about it. If you don't then they
won't. - I like this idea though of focusing on and honoring what it is that
they're interested in. Let that guide some of the material that they
bring in because that will naturally help to support their enthusiasm for
reading. - Exactly. I personally don't enjoy sports, not in sports,
memorabilia sports, anything that has to do with baseball but there are a
collection of authors that have books that athletes love to read because it's
about their sport, it's about their interest, it's what they love.
- So once they get these books from the library or you've introduced them
to these books, they need to make sure they read the whole thing, right? - No,
you should set time aside that they get to read but if they get two pages in and
it's not tugging at their heartstrings or making them want to continue,
drop it. Pick up the next one or take a
day, let them find the thing that they're interested in. There are some the options now
with different genres and the different authors and the different age levels or
groups that there is nothing wrong with stopping a book. - So don't get too uptight
as a parent about, oh my gosh, they started this book they need to finish it.
No, they don't need to. You know what, I just remembered an experience, David, I
want to share it with you and with our viewers today. Years ago, my dad had this
idea that he wanted to encourage all of the grandchildren to read, right? Because
he understands the importance of literacy and some of the things we've
talked about here and so he came up with this program. As a grandfather, a hundred
bucks for a hundred books. - There you go. - And it was a summer reading program
basically and so he was offering all the grandkids, who ever
wanted to do this, a hundred bucks if they could bring him a list of a hundred
books that they had read and it has to be initialed by their parents and
he had, as I recall, there was a list of suggested books and and as long
as a certain percentage or number of those books were from the suggested list
then they qualified for this hundred bucks and the others could be whatever
they wanted to read, right. I thought that was brilliant to put some kind of a
game or an incentive behind a literacy based program and some of the required
books could be read to them so it doesn't have to be within their reading
skill as long as they've got somebody in their little world that they
could draw on. - And I think that's important thing, notice that their
studies that are showing that listening to the book is as effective for your
brain and your comprehension and your an interest as actually physically reading
the book so there's nothing wrong with listening. - And again, it's a
different skill set. So there's still a value to
actually physically reading the words on the page but in terms of the story in
the intellectual stimulation that comes, there's a lot of ways to consume that
content and that's why audiobooks are so popular. - And that makes me think of
something that this shouldn't be happening just in isolation just by
themselves or you're asking them what did you think, I mean, the next
step is have a conversation about the book. Why did you like it? What did you
think about this character? - I love it. - Because then, you're actually remembering
the things that you read and how you felt about it and why you liked it and
then that conversation can lead to what should I read next. - One other point
that you mentioned to me before when we were talking about this particular
episode, you mentioned the value of allowing your child to have their own
library card. This might be the first form of ID that your kid has
but how important you feel when you've got that physical card and you get to
hold it in your hands. I don't know if you remember your first library card but
this is something that would be really awesome. - I was 12 and I used mine
whenever my mom took me to the library but when I got my driver's license and I
had my library card that was the first place I went. I got in the car, I
stalled it a light because it was a manual transmission but when I got to
the library and I was on my own, I don't remember how many books I got but I
remember that was my first personal on my own trip with my driver's license to
the library. - Anything you can do to increase the excitement and the sense of
importance around literacy and reading I think is going to have its
the right direction and Dave, you're putting together some programs and
things you to assist like tutoring programs and resources and they can
get to you through your website. davidlstone.com. We'll put a link
down in the description down below. There's a lot we can do to encourage
your kids to read. - Definitely. There's steps that good readers do that
non-readers don't know and there are definitely some steps that can be
learned and practiced to encourage increase someone's enjoy ability in
reading. - Awesome. Have fun with that. Thank you, Dave. There's some important
tips there for encouraging our kids to read and be more literate. Share this
episode with someone who would appreciate.