Raising Kids Who Read Page 20

  I maintain that these joys cannot be experienced through television or other media. Only reading elicits your contribution to the experience by demanding that you mentally create the world described. Only fiction demands that you live with the characters as long or as deeply. And with few exceptions, prose stylists show greater love of language than artists in other media.

  I want my children and yours to experience those joys, or ones like them. And that’s where you must keep the goal in the forefront of your mind. As someone who has spent all of his professional life around eighteen- to twenty-two-year-olds, I’ll offer my impression as to what causes the greatest conflict between parents and teens. Parents are under the impression that they want their child to be happy. Children are under the impression that their parents want them to be happy the way their parents think they ought to be happy.

  That’s where the danger lies in a child feeling pressured and unhappy about reading. Remember that your goal is that your kids enjoy reading, not that they enjoy reading as you do. For you, it may be literary fiction. For your child, it may be the contemplative precision of poetry, or the muscular plotting of the thriller, or the funhouse distortions of horror. Or perhaps your children will show you the pleasure to be had from Geocacher Magazine or compendia of technical motorcycle engine diagrams. Let your child enjoy and explore the pleasure of reading as he can. And if it helps you, periodically look up from day-to-day life, and recall the principles I suggested at this book’s outset: we start now, and we have fun.

  Have fun.

  APPENDIX

  Accessing the Bonus Web Content

  In a perfect world, a child’s caregiver and teachers are equally committed to helping the child develop a love of reading. But in some cases a teacher must shoulder most or all of the work—for instance, when parents are juggling multiple jobs or have difficulty reading themselves.

  What can teachers do when parent participation is not a sure thing? To access bonus material from Dan Willingham on this topic, go to the publisher’s website at www.wiley.com/go/kidsread and use the password 69720.

  SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER READING

  Readable Reviews of the Scientific Literature on Reading

  Dehaene, S. (2009). Reading in the Brain. New York: Viking. A fairly high-level trade book, using a neuroscientific perspective.

  Kamil, M. L., Pearson, P. D., Moje, E. B., & Afflerbach, P. P. (2011). Handbook of Reading Research (vol. 4). New York: Routledge. A huge volume with chapters on many topics written by leading researchers. It’s meant to be read by other researchers, so it’s far from a beginner’s guide, but if you want the straight research dope, it’s an amazing resource.

  Samuels, S. J., & Farstrup, A. E. (2011). What Research Has to Say about Reading Instruction (4th ed.). Newark, DE: International Reading Association. Another edited volume with contributions from many top reading researchers.

  Wasik, B. H. (2012). Handbook of Family Literacy (2nd ed.). New York: Routledge. Because it’s concerned with literacy more broadly, this book offers chapters on a wider variety of topics, including mathematical literacy and global perspectives on literacy.

  Resources about Raising a Reader

  Cunningham, A., & Zibulsky, J. (2014). Book Smart. New York: Oxford University Press. Similar in spirit to this book, but with more detail on research.

  Institute of Education Sciences practice guides: http://1.usa.gov/1fUvsep. A wonderful, underused resource. These are free, downloadable documents, varying in length, written by expert panels on evidence-based practice. Each guide covers one topic, usually specified by age and content (e.g., “Teaching elementary school children to write”).

  ReadingRockets.com: wonderful website with resources for parents and teachers.

  Dyslexia

  Shaywitz, S. (2003). Overcoming Dyslexia. New York: Random House. Sally Shaywitz is a leading researcher in the field, and this book, although a decade old, is a very readable, practical summary of what’s known and what to do.

  Three websites are excellent resources for up-to-date information about cutting-edge research, as well as passing fads:

  International Dyslexia Association: http://www.interdys.org/

  National Institutes of Health: http://www.ninds.nih.gov/disorders/dyslexia/dyslexia.htm

  Yale Center for Dyslexia and Creativity: http://dyslexia.yale.edu/

  Choosing Books

  Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/genres/childrens. A social networking website for readers with more than 10 million members. Users can write and read reviews among many other functions, and if you “like” books, new titles will be recommended to you.

  Hearne, B., & Stevenson, D. (2000). Choosing books for children: A commonsense guide (3rd ed.). Champaign: University of Illinois Press. Chapters organized by age and topic, each starting with observations about the genre and general advice about book selection within it, then moving on to specific recommendations.

  Lipson, E. R. (2000). The New York Times Parent’s Guide to the Best Books for Children (3rd ed.). New York: Random House. Over five hundred pages of book recommendations with brief descriptions, broadly categorized by age.

  National Education Association’s “Teachers’ Top 100 Books for Children,” http://www.nea.org/grants/teachers-top-100-books-for-children.html. Based on a one-time survey conducted in 2007 and just a single list for all ages. Still, it’s interesting to see what teachers think of as great books for kids.

  Oprah’s Reading List for Kids. Oprah.com has a number of reading suggestions for kids, including lists organized by age and by the child’s interests.

  Read Aloud America: http://www.readaloudamerica.org/booklist.htm. A nonprofit devoted to literacy, lifetime reading, and especially read-alouds. The website offers recommendations finely tuned to age, but no descriptions.

  Trelease, J. (2013). The Read-Aloud Handbook (7th ed.). New York: Penguin. A classic. Trelease gives advice about how to read aloud and offers about 150 pages of suggestions. The accompanying descriptions are brilliantly clear and brief, so that, more than for other lists, you get some flavor of the book. The claimed benefits of reading aloud are a little overhyped, but it’s hard to get snippy with such an eloquent advocate of read-alouds.

  Social Networks for Teen Readers

  Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/forum/book: If you’ve been to Amazon.com (and who hasn’t?) you’re familiar with the book reviews. There are also discussions, separate from the reviews. Popular books have lively discussions, and because everyone knows about Amazon, they are often heavily populated.

  Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/genres/young-adult: Like Amazon, this site is meant for all readers, not just teens, and like Amazon, users can comment on other people’s posts and “like” them. Goodreads also allows the posting of pictures and animated GIFs, which teens do in abundance. It gives the young adult section a much more teen-oriented sensibility.

  readergirlz.com, guyslitwire.com, teenreads.com: These three websites are written by and for people who are already serious readers; each relishes its persona of slight nerdiness. They offer reviews, a blog, author interviews, and so on. They might be a welcome home for teens who like reading but don’t have friends who do.

  Hi-Lo Publishers

  The following publishers have good Hi-Lo lists. You can also search for “hi-lo books” or “hi-lo publishers” on the web:

  Capstone: http://www.capstoneclassroom.com/content/home_hilo

  High Noon: http://www.highnoonbooks.com/index-hnb.tpl

  Orca: http://us.orcabook.com/catalog.cfm?CatPos=373

  Perfection Learning: http://www.perfectionlearning.com/browse.php?categoryID=3929

  Saddleback: http://www.sdlback.com/hi-lo-reading

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