My child is behind in reading, what are the options? The common answer is simple: Children have to read more. But, what if my child isn’t enjoying reading? Or struggles while doing so? What else can I do?
Reading is not a skill just for school; it must be one for life; therefore it must be an enjoyable experience. We all know that it is important to read to babies from birth. It makes a significant difference in a child's development of language, cognitive skills, and memory, as well as introduces them to concepts of stories, letters, numbers, shapes, and information about our world. However, once children enter school and become independent readers, we expect reading to improve by further independent reading. This works for the very best readers who lose themselves in books. But what happens when your child isn’t the best reader in the class? What happens when they do the minimum amount of reading possible? Here are five ways for children to master and enjoy reading.
1. Listen to books on CD. Research shows that "a combination of reading and listening to the world of an engaging story can be extremely beneficial in the classroom.” For my eleven-year-old son, Nicholas, reading was always a challenge. He would take five minutes to read one page of a Goosebumps book. Skilled readers can read such books in one hour or less. At this time, our family lived in Lubbock, Texas—a middle-of-nowhere city on Texas's high plain. It takes a six-hour drive (one-way) to visit Dallas, a similar length of time to visit San Antonio or Santa Fe, and over ten hours of driving to Denver. The school librarian recommended we listen to books on CD. So, we did, for hours on end.
Listening exposes the reader to the language at the rate of their peers allowing them to enter a new era. Background knowledge, story structure, vocabulary, and enjoyment are all enhanced by listening. Listening to books such as Kathleen Karr's Gilbert and Sullivan Set Me Free, includes the music of Gilbert and Sullivan at the beginning of each chapter. This adds a dimension not available to a reader, adding much more to the story's whole. Books with full cast audios have different voices for each character, engaging readers easier. Our family may have started listening when we traveled, but it soon expanded to listening while playing at home, traveling around the town, and listening at home for pure enjoyment. My students who have made the greatest gains in literacy were the ones who listened to the most audio books. Listening puts struggling readers on par with the skilled readers.
2. Turn a child’s favorite book into a "readers theatre drama." I use this strategy with every struggling reader from grades one to ten. What is the difference between teaching a first and a tenth grader? The books I choose to use with them. By turning books into a drama, characters come alive. They feel pain, embarrassment, joy, and laughter. And when a character has such emotions, the whole of a person is involved, just like professional actors. The readers cannot be bored when they are the character. Misunderstandings, or lack of comprehension, are more easily identified as an action is required. Actions show in their body language, voice, and their costumes. And when one has prepared a play, it must be performed. Re-reading is essential as students want to be fluent in their reading.
The best readers are active readers. By being active, they can engage in the text, make connections, ask questions, re-reading passages, and look for additional reading. Readers theatre creates active involvement in books. Take a book your child loves and re-write it as a script. Or, take a look online, like Aaron Shepard Readers Theatre, whose scripts are free to download.
3. Watch the movie, then read the book. As a child, I was not a great reader and it took me many years to become a reader. Once I tried to Anne of Green Gables, but gave up. There were too many words which didn’t seem to take me anywhere. One day, the movie was on TV and I watched it. The movie gave me an arch to the story that I couldn’t see by reading. The characters took shape and I was hooked. It became a book I just had to read. Not only did read the book, but I invested in the whole series. Today, I am still swept up in the relationships of Anne, Matthew, Marilla and Gilbert.
4. Talk about books. What do you like? Dislike? What stands out in your memory? Living in Lubbock, our favorite books included the Hank the Cowdog series by John Erickson. As a family, we'd laughed at Ericson’s use of language and his ability to connect unrelated words to add further humor to the drama faced by the characters daily. We loved Bruce Coville’s Aliens ate my homework. And I know when my son started repeating sentences or phrases in the voice of the characters, it was a clear sign he enjoyed reading.
5. Listen and read along with the book before reading independently. This strategy can be a bit difficult if you are following audio speed. Follow the audio version for a short period of time, and then have a parent read along with a child, and just ahead of the reader. Or, read the same passage a number of times. Keep the experience enjoyable and listen more before trying to follow the text.
Different strategies work for different readers. Try a few, see what works, and commit to the most effective.
References: Godsey, M. (2016). Listen to this. Literacy Today, 34 (3), 28-29.
