Parent Resources

20 Ways to Encourage Reading

Children are curious by nature! Once they find the material they love, they’ll read! If your child has a reading disorder like dyslexia, reading may be very frustrating and discouraging. If your little one is reluctant to read for whatever reason, try these tips and see what works best for them. Reading is not a race; the long term love for knowledge and adventure is much more important!

1. Scout for things your children might like to read. Use their interests and hobbies as starting points.
2. Leave all sorts of reading materials including books, magazines, and colorful catalogs in conspicuous places around your home.
3. Notice what attracts your child’s attention – even if they only look at the pictures – and then build on that interest. Read a short selection aloud, or simply bring home more information on the same subject. And remember, comic books count! Instruction manuals count! Is your child crazy about tractors? Ask the local dealer for a tractor catalog! Reading is a tool to help us reach our dreams, whatever they are!
4. Let your children see you reading for pleasure in your spare time.
5. Take your children to the library regularly. Explore the children's section together. Ask a librarian to suggest books and magazines your children might enjoy.
6. Present reading as an activity with a purpose; a way to gather useful information for, say, making paper airplanes, identifying a doll or stamp in your child's collection, or planning a family trip.
7. Encourage your child to read to their younger brothers and sisters. Older children enjoy showing off their skills to an admiring audience!
8. Play games that are reading-related. Check your closet for spelling games played with letter tiles or dice, or board games that require players to read spaces, cards, and directions. (Just a note! If your child has a reading disorder like dyslexia, games like Boggle are actually painful. Just keep that in mind when selecting a game!)
9. Perhaps over dinner, while you're running errands, or in another informal setting, share your reactions to things you read, and encourage your children to do likewise.
10. Set aside a regular time for reading in your family, independent of schoolwork, the 20 minutes before lights out, just after dinner, or whatever fits into your household schedule. As little as 10 minutes of free reading a day can help improve your child's skills and habits. (Reading to your child at bedtime will also become some of your fondest memories.)
11. Read aloud to your child, especially a child who is discouraged by his or her own poor reading skills. The pleasure of listening to you read, rather than struggling alone, may restore your child's initial enthusiasm for books and reading.
12. Encourage your child to read aloud to you an exciting passage in a book, an interesting tidbit in the newspaper, or a joke in a joke book. When children read aloud, they do not need to get every word right. Even the best readers skip or mispronounce words now and then.
13. On gift-giving occasions, give books and magazines based on your child's current interests.
14. Set aside a special place for children to keep their own books.
15. Introduce the bookmark. Remind your youngster that you don't have to finish a book in one sitting; you can stop after a few pages, or a chapter, and pick up where you left off at another time. Don't try to persuade your child to finish a book he or she doesn't like. Recommend putting the book aside and trying another.
16. Reading doesn't have to be serious! Treat your children to an evening of laughter and entertainment featuring books! Many children (parents, too) regard reading as a serious activity. A joke book, a story told in riddles, or a funny passage read aloud can reveal another side of reading.
17. Extend your child's positive reading experiences. For example, if your youngster enjoyed a book about dinosaurs, follow up with a visit to a natural history museum.
18. Offer other special incentives to encourage your child's reading. Allow your youngster to stay up an extra 15 minutes to finish a chapter; promise to take your child to see a movie after he or she has finished the book on which it was based; relieve your child of a regular chore to free up time for reading.
19. Limit your children's TV viewing in an effort to make time for other activities, such as reading. But never use TV as a reward for reading, or a punishment for not reading.
20. Not all reading takes place between the covers of a book! What about menus, road signs, food labels, and sheet music? Take advantage of countless spur-of-the-moment opportunities for reading during the course of your family's busy day.