Kids Who Don't Like to Read

I had a break through of sorts on our visit to our grandkids in London. My oldest grandson(7),a reluctant reader(to use an out of fashion term), read one of his reading books to his 3 year old adoring brother and he actually enjoyed it! As I listened to his effort, I was reminded of the many children, mostly boys but some girls too, whom I tried to help through their learning-to-read days. We librarians know the secret to growing readers .... find the books they want to read. But just because we know the secret doesn't mean it's easy. Believe me, I've had some hard nuts to crack so to speak, and I certainly wasn't successful in every case. Those of us who didn't struggle to read probably can't even remember how we learned to read, so somehow we think it shouldn't take as long as it actually does to reach fluency. As in all things, success begets success and those children who start out slowly (I'm not talking about the kids with learning problems here)can get discouraged pretty quickly. There's no way they get better at reading if they don't practice reading. That's where we librarians come in. The first step is to find out their interests. My grandson loves all things Star Wars so I had bought him a few of the DK beginning reader books about the subject. We spent a fun half hour making a list of the books he wanted from the titles on the back of those books. We ended up with 32 titles! Intermingled with the expected space adventure type books are a few surprising ones .... Born to be a butterfly; I can swim!; A trip to the theater. But are they surprising for a boy whose other Grandma raises butterflies, whose aunt and uncle are actors and who loves boogie boarding? Now my job is to bundle up some of these books and send them off to London. I'm going to start with the easier reading level titles in the hopes he will read to his brother again. And I'll be sure to have a number of other titles from his list scattered around the house when he is here in April. I'm hoping he'll become a reader before he knows it.

Travel

We’ve been in London this last week and it may be for the last time. Strange to think of it that way. My son and his family have been living here for five years so we’ve visited often. Two summers ago I came and stayed for 6 weeks to help out when our third grandchild was born. London feels very much like a second home to us. But this summer the kids will be moving back to the US and we’ll have no more reason to make the trek. Of all the experiences you gain when you become a parent, sharing your children’s adult lives is not the one you think much about or even expect. When we married, we ventured a state or two away from home. Not so our children’s generation. And the upshot is that not only has their world expanded but so has ours. When we return to RI next week, we’ll be anticipating a visit with our daughter and her husband in Baton Rouge. They moved south last July and this will be our first trip there. I expect it’s quite different from New England or London. My husband and I both look forward to discovering another place we never could have anticipated would be a significant part of our lives.

By the way, last Monday London ‘enjoyed’ the biggest snowstorm they’ve had in 18 years…. 6 inches. The kids had two snow days and made a snowman on the patio. Yesterday (Thursday) the snow was gone and we’re back to the usual rain.