Does your son like to read? Congratulations, Dad, you're doing your job.
A new study out of Australia says boys in two-parents households are more likely to read if their father does. If Mom reads, girls do too. In single-parent households (where Mom is usually the present parent - at least in this study), kids of both genders were equally influenced by Mom's reading habits. So what's the catch?
Parents need to put in at least fifty minutes of daily reading time for their efforts to have any affect on their kids, the study concluded, and too few parents do. The figures showed only seventeen percent of boys are reading and only twenty-six percent of girls - and that included their homework.
It all sounds like a no-brainer to me. I often harp on the time I stood in the mall bookstore listening to a mother whine to the clerk that she was starting a book club with her friends, but she doesn't really like to read. "Do you have anything fun to read?" she asked. "Most books are boring." She said this with her son (who looked to be about seven) standing right beside her. It's no wonder when she turned to him and asked, "Do you want me to buy you anything?" that he shook his head. "No, can we go to Target now?" he asked.
You just said books are boring, lady, and you really expect your kid to say, "yeah, I want this one, and this one, and this one?"
What struck me most about the study, however, was the reminder that parents reading isn't enough. You have to do it IN FRONT OF your kids. Again, a no brainer. But that's the hard part. I get most of my reading in at bedtime, after my three-year-old is snuggled into her bed. Either my husband or I make sure we do the nightly book before bed with her, but our own reading habits are largely closeted. Not because we're hiding them from her, but because there's simply little time during the day to read while she's awake.
There's work, making dinner, giving her a bath, playing with her . . . even the times I try to curl up on the couch with the latest piece of fluff I've checked out of the library to escape into is interrupted by the dog who has to go out, the phone ringing, the pre-schooler who wants a cup of juice. Still, I try. We visit the library - a lot. I keep my books and magazines scattered around the house. I read to her, and each holiday is celebrated with a new book.
How do you keep them reading?
Image: YourDictionary.com
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