Read On:
Helping kids develop a love of reading
by Stephen Hume

As 570,000 kids head back to school this fall, more than 145,000 of them in the primary grades and 35,000 of those entering Grade 1 for the first time, the annual anxiety fest over reading skills begins anew for parents and teachers alike.

Stress for parents because they know that reading is the most fundamental and necessary skill required for success in the information economy. This leaves them vulnerable to an over-emphasis on skills development in which schools and students wind up being constantly measured against both each other and against a set of arbitrary standards which supposedly establish learning outcomes.

Stress for primary grade teachers because they know that despite the current obsession with “standards” of achievement, kids have never developed their reading skills in lockstep, cohort by cohort. Children progress towards literacy at astonishingly diverse rates and it’s not unusual for a child whose parents fret that he or she is not reading Dr. Seuss in Grade 3 to be reading Jane Austen in Grade 8.

Even youngsters who face real barriers to the development of reading skills will usually have successful outcomes once those barriers are identified and if there is early intervention by teachers who now have a host of strategies for overcoming deficits.

So the message for most parents at this time of year should be: chill out. By all means pay attention to your child’s reading development, get lots of feedback from the teacher, but do it in the knowledge that reading skills are best acquired according to the child’s learning schedule, not the agendas of adults.

That said, there remains plenty for parents to do in supporting the development of their children’s reading skills.
The first and perhaps most important thing parents can do is to show that they value reading. If you want your kids to read, don’t lecture them about its importance, show that it’s important to you by reading for your own pleasure and education and do it when they are around.

Kids are not stupid. If you tell them that reading is important but spend all your own leisure time watching television, they’ll get the message—TV is more fun than a book.

Read novels, short stories, creative non-fiction, science, history and biography so that kids come to associate reading with pleasure, excitement and solving mysteries. If the only reading they see you do is to obtain specific information for some practical purpose—household renovations, how to get rich in the real estate market, prepping for the business brief you have to deliver—you’re teaching your kids to associate reading with work in a world full of pleasurable and convenient alternatives, probably not the best incentive for nine-year-olds.

Find something that interests them—outer space, dinosaurs, pre-teen fashion, pop music, art, sports—and pick up some well-written contemporary magazines with articles and pictures that speak to their interests. If the graphics are strong, there’s an incentive to find out what the story’s about—if they ask, read it to them, show them that the real story, the richer story, is in the text.

Have books, lots of books, all kinds of books, around the house—that sends the unspoken signal that reading is not some special project; it’s just something everybody learns as a matter of course.

If the family budget is tight, hit the used book stores and thrift shops where you can find everything from rare classics to mass market thrillers, usually at vast markdowns from the original selling price.

Encourage your kids to read what interests them, not what interests you. If they like graphic novels (a comic-book-like novel, usually with a lengthy and complex storyline), consider the “cartoons”—some of them are highly sophisticated—a portal into more traditional forms of fiction and non-fiction.
 
Remember that the heart of reading is access to other people’s writing, so request a tour of the school library and ask some of the pointed questions advocated by the British Columbia Coalition for School Libraries:
Is the library staffed full time by a trained librarian or by somebody expected to do the job part time? Is it staffed by a teacher who is asked to fill in as necessary or by untrained volunteers who are there to manage checkouts and book returns? If there’s no trained librarian, ask why not.
 
What are the library hours? Is it open before school, during lunch break, after school?

Are the books current? Is there a wide range of materials that will appeal to both boys and girls and to readers of different ages, sophistication and taste? A rich collection of research materials? Books that challenge and stretch imaginations, even if they make you feel a bit uncomfortable?

What is the school’s budget for acquiring new books and how much of that budget is actually spent each year? According to the Canadian School Library Association, an elementary school should budget up to $35/student for new acquisitions each year; up to $45/year for high school students.

Does the librarian work with classroom teachers to prepare research and reading programs tailored to specific classes and specific subjects?

If the answer to any of these questions is unsatisfactory, bring it up at your next parent advisory council meeting and let your principal and school board trustees know that because reading and literacy are such fundamental and important skills, you want school budgets and resources to reflect that value.

Be polite and proactive. Avoid confrontation, but find out how you can best help the school’s library resources to become better. Don’t be compliant. B.C.’s provincial government says its mission is to make the province the most literate jurisdiction on the continent. Early in 2007, the Ministry of Education announced that libraries were “a cornerstone” of its literacy action plan.

Well, this is a democracy. If parents agree that reading is an important skill for their children to develop and they don’t think their school library is sufficiently recognized in budget allocations, professional staffing, overall accessibility or material resources, it seems both reasonable and prudent to let their elected politicians know exactly where they stand on the issue.

Stephen Hume’ s fondest Grade 4 memories include his father asking the Alberni Valley library to grant his son adult borrowing privileges on grounds that when his kids were able to read they were ready to read whatever took their fancy.