Skip to main content

The young readers' dilemma

Sometimes it really hits me just how many and varied are the responsibilities of parenting. There's stuff like the values we model, and then there's other stuff like making sure they get to all their teeth when they brush. It's a big gig.

It's a gig that gives me infinite joy, (oh, and sleepless nights occasionally too) but I don't take the responsibility lightly. I'm conscientious, that's just how I'm wired.

And I'm also a librarian. 

So, imagine this:
I go to my daughter's parent/teacher interview, and am told that my child is doing just fine (good), but....there's one thing....(uh oh)

she could do with extending her reading.


As I walk past the empty playground after the meeting I erupt; "bwah hahahaha". Because the irony certainly isn't lost on me. 

But, I'm so glad for that parent/teacher meeting.  It got me to thinking. Both my older children have been hooked on reading book series - churned out, formulaic and safe. Up until now, I mostly just let them be, reassuring myself that 'atleast they were reading', and afraid that if I interfered I might upset them in their embryonic phase of 'becoming readers'.

But after a nudge from the teacher, I began to think about what the kids have been missing out on by playing it safe. Although I do think that reading of any kind is valuable, and I don't want to get to a stage when I am judging a book good or bad,  I was reminded of the value in encouraging children to read books with depth, books that stretch them, that allow them to really see life through another's eyes, to develop empathy, and inhabit someone else's  world, sharing their experience of challenges faced and overcome.  I know that this much is true: thanks to an incredible home library, and no TV, I read a lot of amazing books when I was young, and by experiencing hardship, difference and other people's worlds vicariously, I  created a strong foundation of experience to draw on in the face of life's real challenges big and small.

So, by the time I arrived home that night after the meeting, I had a plan. To set both of them a challenge; a "five book challenge", each list containing books that I knew would take them out of their comfort zones, that would challenge their thinking, but also that would hopefully inspire them to keep on reaching for books that 'stretched' them. 

And, I've been amazed! Like me, sometimes they just need a nudge.

Comments

  1. How great that you have the info available to hand them a list! Although I agree with the teacher in some ways I certainly see where you were coming from... children/teens etc reading is a HUGE thing. It is amazing how many DON'T read. Even I like to pick a series and immerse myself in only that for a while. We all need a little nudge sometimes to get out of our comfort zones :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. What a great idea to set them a challenge! I love how you responded to disappointing news- great parenting!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Great idea. My two are firmly entrenched in the Goosbumps Horrorland and Gerinimo Stilton series. A wee challenge could be a good thing for them too.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

A cup of tea and a bit of book chat - September with The Conductor and Yoghurt Banana Muffins

Every quite often it seems a New Zealand author writes a book that I love so much that I can't stop talking about it. In the last few years there was Let Me Sing You Gentle Songs, then Mr Pip , and this time it is..... The Conductor by Sarah Quigley. The Conductor by Sarah Quigley It's cold, it's spare and it's very stark, but Sarah Quigley has created something powerfully beautiful in this book that follows the story of the composition and first performance of Shostakovich's 7th symphony amidst the seige on Leningrad by the Nazi's in 1941. Based around the story of Shostakovich’s single-minded endeavour to write his 7 th Symphony, and see it performed, the book shows the lengths that an artist will go to to express himself. While most people are fleeing the city, and others starving and dying, Shostakovich determinedly writes his piece of music, and it falls upon conductor Karl Eliasberg to rise above his own starvation and grief to bring toget...

A cup of tea and a bit of book chat!

Welcome to our first Cup of Tea and a Bit of Book Chat session Surely, one of life's greatest joys is having friends who recommend you good books. With that in mind, I really want to start monthly blog book chat sessions with you all. I'll start with the best book/s I've read during the month (I'll try to limit myself to two!) and would love it if you post your latest read too. Bring your favourite vintage teacup, and I'll bring the baking. This is going to be fun! Well.....down to it then. I've had such a great pile of books beside my bed this month, that I'm having trouble choosing! I will go with the two books that have inspired me the most of all: Short Fat Chick in Paris by Kerre Woodham & Gareth Brown - published by Harper Collins If you are having trouble dragging yourself off the couch to fulfil your ambitious new year sporting resolutions, then this is the book for you. A follow-up book from Kerre Woodham's first book Short Fat Ch...