Parenting

8 Tips for Raising Baby Bookworms

This week I’ve teamed up with Jenny from Raising Boys with Books to talk about two of my favorite topics – reading and kids. Lately, I’ve been on a mission to show my very busy toddler that reading is fun. As soon as I discovered Jenny’s awesome blog, I knew she was the perfect person to help. Hopefully, you’ll find her tips and tricks as helpful, insightful and entertaining as I did.

Meet Jenny from Raising Boys with Books

When I started blogging a couple of months ago, I had no idea that I would have the opportunity to meet so many wonderful moms and learn so much from them by reading about their journeys through motherhood. But I have, and Megan is one of the moms I have enjoyed reading posts from the most! When we started emailing about collaborating and she asked me to write a post about raising readers, I was nervous. As an English teacher and a mom-blogger, one of my main insecurities is that I sound too preachy about books and reading.

While I may be able to write a mean argumentative essay and analyze the dickens out of Dickens, I am also just a typical mom (one who tends to find herself way funnier than she actually is) to two young boys. I am not a parenting expert, and the tips I share are just things that have worked for my boys and my family. Though I occasionally reference my experiences as a teacher, I hope you will read the tips simply as ideas from another mom and forgive me if I ever sound like I am too high up on my soapbox! Sometimes I get on a roll and I just can’t stop myself.

Thank you to Megan for collaborating with me! Be sure to check out her post about her favorite books for a one-year-old over on my blog, Raising Boys with Books. Okay, here I go!

Tips for Raising Readers

One of my favorite quotes is, “A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies. The man who never reads lives only one” by George R.R. Martin. Another is, “There is no such thing as a child who hates to read; there are only children who have not found the right book” by Frank Serafini.

These are the two things I go back to over and over again when trying to inspire my students to read and trying to raise my own two boys to be readers themselves.

When I became a high school teacher, I saw how many of my students did not identify as readers. These were certainly not bad kids; often they were kids who did well in my class. However, I also saw the effects of a life without books. Or more specifically, I still see the positive effects of a life full of reading which shows me the negative effects of a life without.

Just One Small Example

We do weekly vocabulary study in my class. The words are not overly complicated, but they are not the most familiar either. I have a few kids every year who do not really need to study in order to do well. When we discuss the words as a class and try to come up with synonyms and sentences to better understand each one, other kids are always amazed that a few of their classmates can come up with perfect synonyms so quickly. When the question of how comes up, I always stop the kid mid-awkward explanation of, “Uuhhh, I don’t know, I just …” and say, “I know! You like to read, don’t you?!” Inevitably, they say yes, and I go on to enthusiastically explain how much reading does for you, even if you don’t realize it is doing it. I disregard the grumbles (and there are always grumbles) and focus instead on the kids who are quietly smiling because they are already readers and the ones who look actually intrigued by the idea that reading could make them smarter!

I tend to avoid showing my students the statistics about childhood reading because the last thing I want to do is discourage them or make them think that just because their parents didn’t read to them as kids, they will never be able to catch up. But if you are here, my assumption is that you want to read more to your kiddos, so here is evidence from HarperCollins as to why that is a GREAT idea!

Because I was a teacher for almost 6 years before I had kids, I knew that I would need to strive very hard to raise my own children to fall into the reader category. Because I love books so much myself and reading was such a huge part of my childhood, it came pretty naturally to me to do so. But because my boys have minds of their own (darn them) and don’t always want to do the things I want them to, I have had to think quite a bit about how to ensure that they stick with reading and how I help them grow into the readers I want them to be.

1. Start ‘Em Young

My first tip is to start reading to your kiddos when they are babies. Maybe even before. As babies (and in the womb) they are a captive audience. Even if they are falling asleep on your lap or in your arms while you are reading, they are still hearing the words. Learning that this is how we communicate and learn to love reading time. You might feel silly or like you are reading to yourself, but I promise it is worth it!

2. Stick with It

That leads me to my second tip, develop a regular reading routine. If you start when your kiddo is a baby, this will be even easier to do, but if not, it is still completely possible. For us, reading is always the last thing we do before sleep. When the boys were babies, we lived by the 4 B’s for bedtime: bath, book, breast or bottle, bed. As they grow up you just drop the 3rd B (and often the 1st because who has time to give their kids a bath every day) and you have a routine for life!

I don’t know about yours, but my boys fight tiredness with all of their might. My oldest is almost 7, and I swear to you, last month was the first time he actually admitted to me that he was tired. Both of them tend to get really wound up when they are tired. It is almost as if they know that if they stop jumping off the walls, they will fall asleep, and there is NO WAY they are doing that.

When we read right before bed, it gives them a chance to let their body relax before they go to sleep. It also gives mama some guaranteed snuggle time every day, not sure I need more of a reason than that. We used to read in the rocking chair before we rocked to sleep, but both of my boys are too big for rocking now (it’s horrible how quickly that stops!), so now we pick out a book (usually two) and I climb right in their big boy beds to read to them before giving them a kiss and turning off the light for sleep.

I do know other families who do book time first thing in the morning (not gonna happen when I have to be at school at 7:35 am every day!), and it works perfectly for them. Whatever time works for you is great, and if you keep it consistent it will just become one of the things you do, and your kids will just become kids who read (woohoo!).

3. Make Reading Special for Each Kid

Although I truly think this one may work differently for each family, this is just another thing that works for us. My third tip is to do book time separately for each kiddo. It is a great way for each kid to get some uninterrupted alone time with mom and/or dad every day (we try to both be in the room with each kid every night, but that doesn’t always happen for multiple reasons – most nights, but definitely not all). For kids with siblings, alone time with one or both parents does not happen all that often, so this aspect of it might help if you are having trouble getting your kiddo interested in reading.

4. Find Topics They Love

My next few tips are more about the books you choose than when or how often you read them. We are fortunate enough to have lots of books (I’ll give you a couple of ideas about how to build your collection below). But we still make regular trips to the library and bookstore just so we can keep things interesting. The fourth tip, read books about the things kids are interested in, is one of the best ways to raise kids who love to read.

Even if it sometimes pains me to read the same dinosaur books (or worse a book about Minecraft – ugh) over and over again, I still do so because that is what my boys are into right now. When kids find out that if they look in a book they can learn more, see more, hear more about the stuff they already love, they are hooked. And once you hook them you can convince them that the Minecraft book is really one they can read on their own so you guys can read something (anything!) else together.

Dinosaur and Minecraft Books

5. Shop!

I mentioned this one above, but here it is as the fifth tip: make special trips to the library and/or bookstore to find new books. Marketing works. When your kids see book displays about things they love, they will be much more excited to read the books they find. Libraries and bookstores are great at marketing their books, and if kids feel like they have some autonomy in picking out the books they read at home, they will be more likely to actually want to read them.

6. Get Technical

Another way marketing reaches kiddos is through TV or a personal device, which leads me to my sixth tip, incorporate technology. I know this may sound crazy, but hear me out. We live in a technological world, and if we can use that to our advantage to help kids see the power of books and understand that they don’t have to be boring old stodgy things, I say yes, please. One of our favorite authors is Mo Willems. Everything he writes is genuinely wonderful, and his books alone will help you grow readers. But if you need a little technology to help too, he has an app called “Don’t Let the Pigeon Run This App” (only available for iOS) which lets your kiddo participate in making stories, playing games, and just having fun with this awesome book character. We also occasionally buy books about the TV characters our kids love. This is a great way to get them excited about reading in general, and many of them are genuinely good books! And I promise, once you get them into books (even using technology), it will be so much easier for them to continue to find new ones that they love.

7. Build a Collection

My seventh (and last – I think) tip about encouraging your kiddos to read is this, build your library by asking for and giving books as presents. This can start even before your baby is born! When I had a baby shower for my oldest son, my hosts asked invitees to bring a book instead of a card to the shower. They could write a note to the baby in the cover and it would serve as a keepsake for years to come! This was a great way to build my baby book library, and I am so happy we did it. Many books are not much more expensive than cards, and this helped us to be green (as much as I may have wanted to keep them, all those cards would have eventually ended up in the trash) as well.

Baby Shower Books as Gifts

You could definitely continue this trend for birthdays as well! Or, if you are like us and tend to think that the kids get waaaayyy too many presents for birthdays and holidays, you could ask relatives and close friends to only bring books as presents. This one is admittedly easier said than done, as the people we are closest to often want to give the boys something they think is more exciting. Who doesn’t want to see their gift bring intense joy to a kiddo they love? So another option might be to ask other invitees (you know, the ones who come when your kiddo convinces you that you NEED to invite his entire class) to only bring a book. Maybe it would even be easier for people who don’t really know what to get anyway.

We definitely give books ourselves sometimes too. Easter and Valentine’s Day are great holidays for new books! And giving them is a great way to cut down on all.the.toys.

8. Choose Interactive Books

So I was wrong, I have one more tip! This is one I have talked about on my blog a lot. Lots of the books I end up reviewing fall in this category. My last tip (for real this time) is to read interactive books. This is especially helpful when your little readers are in the 1 to 3 yo range. Kids love interactive books, and they help reinforce the fun of reading time by keeping them interested and engaged. One of the other things I notice in my high school “readers” is that they are best able to picture the scenes of a book in their mind. They are engaged when they are reading, and that helps them to play little “book movies” in their brains as they go. The engagement also increases comprehension by leaps and bounds. Practicing this engagement with young kiddos now is one of the best things you can do.

Here are some of our favorite interactive books for the 1 to 3 age range:

The Monster at the End of This Book – by Jon Stone

Don’t Push the Button!

That’s Not My… – an Usborne Books series – A favorite in this house is definitely, That’s Not My Dinosaur

Caps for Sale: A Tale of a Peddler Some Monkeys and Their Monkey Business – by Esphyr Slobodkina – An oldie but a goodie!

Press Here – by Herve Tullet

Thank you for reading and again, thank you so much to Megan for collaborating with me and allowing me to write this post! You can check out her post about her favorite books for 1-year-olds on my site, Raising Boys with Books. I hope you found some useful hints for raising readers. If you have any of your own, please share in the comments below! I would LOVE to hear how you are raising your own readers. As moms, we can all use all the help we can get!!

What Did We Miss?

Thank you so much to Jenny for sharing her awesome tips for raising readers! Don’t forget to check out Raising Boys with Books for more ideas!

What other tips do you have for raising children who love to read?

Awesome tips from a teacher and mom of two to help parents to instill a love of reading in their young children. Eight tips to raise readers and bookworms that busy moms and dads can try out with their babies and toddlers. Everything from which books to try to when to read and how to find books that your kids will learn from and will still hold their attention. Guest post from Jenny of Raising Boys With Books.

2 thoughts on “8 Tips for Raising Baby Bookworms

  1. I can’t express how much I love this! We adore books in our house. Our toddler loves books! Lately he’s been into everything ocean related, so we picked up some ocean themed books and they keep him busy forever! Before our first was born we asked that people not get him cards, and give books instead since they’re not that much more expensive and can be used much longer. Two babies later and as a result we have a huge collection of books – it’s great! We never run out of books to read to them and each one has a special message in it from someone who loves them.

    1. Thanks Jen! I totally agree – it’s so fun to collect and share books with our toddler. Getting him to sit still while we read a book cover to cover is a whole other story so I was super excited when Jenny agreed to share some tips!

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