Read To Your Children

Really, really, I don't want this blog to be one of those things I start that fizzles off after a few entries. In that vein, here are some recent thoughts I've been wanting to share (ok, more like bossy instructions, but I've just been itching to get them out there, and what's a blog for if not to offer unasked advice to innocent online passers-by?)


Please, please, if you are a parent, or a grandparent, or an uncle or an aunt or a wonderful friend to some busy parents, READ TO YOUR CHILDREN!!  Read to them when they're little nurslings.  Read to them when they're busy toddlers who turn every page before you finish it.  Read to them when they're in elementary school. Read to them when they're in high school.  Read to them even when they're such accomplished readers you have a hard time prying them away from those books to, you know, eat and bathe.  It's not crazy.  It's wonderful.  And don't worry too much about the reading level of the books you choose, just make sure they're good, worthwhile books. It's amazing what children are capable of gleaning from stories of all levels, at all ages.  


Right now, one of Bluejay's favorite books is James Herriot's Moses the Kitten.  You can see from the reviews on Amazon how many readers struggle with the complexity of the language in this book when sharing it with children.  You know who doesn't have a problem with that vocabulary?  A two-and-a-half year old.  It's no big deal to him.  He's used to words he doesn't fully understand.  He likes it because it's a good story.  I bet you anything he's learning to love language just by being immersed in it.  I know I was.  Here are a couple of excerpts:


"There was a frozen pond just off the path and among the rime-covered rushes which fringed the dead opacity of the surface a small object stood out, shiny black. I went over and looked closer.  It was a tiny kitten, probably about six weeks old, huddled and immobile, eyes tightly closed."


"...I stared unbelievingly down at a large sow stretched comfortably on her side, suckling a litter of about twelve piglets and right in the middle of the long pink row, furry black and incongruous, was Moses. He had a teat in his mouth and was absorbing his nourishment with the same rapt enjoyment as his smooth-skinned fellows on either side."

Moses the Kitten

James Herriot

When I was growing up, I was very blessed to be often read to, even though I was the oldest of five.  I was read to by my mother.  I was read to by my father. I was read to by many other wonderful adults.  My mom read all of the Little House on the Prairie books to us (well, except for The First Four Years, which I would still leave out), and The King of Ireland's Son, and Anne of Green Gables, and lots of others.  My dad read David Copperfield to four of us, ranging in ages from about 5 to 12.  It's my favorite book to this day, and I've read it countless times to myself.  He read Tolkien and CS Lewis and Dickens and many other books to the whole group of us, and it was So. Much. More. Fun. than television or watching a movie.  Don't get me wrong, it was still a treat to watch TV. But there was something about being read to that was the greatest.  Every night before bed, we would beg for just one more chapter, and all of us remember it and grew as readers and thinkers most largely from that one activity of our youth.


Also, to those of you who aren't used to reading aloud, or feel uncomfortable about it, there's no one who is less judgmental or more forgiving than your young ones.  And even listening to great books on tape together counts.  Trust me, you'll love it as much as they do.