We have a 2 year old who love books now (like most toddlers). We read to him every day (10+ books) and we have nightly family reading time where my husband and I read while the toddler flips through his board books.
I’m a high school teacher and I rarely see male students who like to read for fun. What can we do as parents to keep our son interested in reading into childhood and teenage years?
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My parents. My dad was a technical writer, and my mom was an English teacher. They read to me every night throughout my childhood.
Over time, they introduced me to more complicated books and always made time to discuss them with me. Reading *The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn* with my dad around age 9 or 10 was a very important event in my life.
Yeah, I read a lot of books growing up. Courtesy of being a lonely nerd with no friends. Sorry if that’s not helpful to you.
Parents both read so I copied that being a home body and the library had computers before my family did
I grew up dirt poor and my mom worked in a pawn shop. She’d bring home books for me to read since I had nothing else to do.
To be completely honest, because I had to in school. Eventually I realized it wasn’t as bad as all my classmates said it was and I took a liking to it because of the books we read, and it’s stayed with me till this day.
Neglect
I was clinically deaf for the first 6-7 years of my life. After a surgery, I recovered my hearing.
I needed speech therapy. In an effort to help, my mom had me read out loud to her.
Hated her for it at the time, but soon enough, there was never a time when I didn’t have a book in my hands. I even started getting in trouble for reading too much.
Escaping the reality of my annoying siblings.
Both of my parents read to me as early as I can remember
Mostly curiosity, my dad in particular tried to make me read some classics and the encyclopedia/dictionary when I was pretty young, but was too young to understand Charles dickens and trying to get anyone to read a dictionary is probably a bad idea. But the encyclopedia I did like and gravitated towards science type stuff a lot. He’d make me read for a certain amount of hours a day before I could earn tv time. I don’t think I had full “tv rights” until I got into HS, but I did have books.
Some of this was sparked by snooping, when I was 4ish I found his medical reference stuff and aviation books (he was a pilot for a hospital at the time) and thought that was cool and realized they’d been leaving some bits out about how babies were made. Remember the look of panic in their eyes when I “explained” that to them whipping out the diagrams but from that point on I mostly read nonfiction type stuff. It might be weird but I still have a hard time getting into fiction but I genuinely enjoy nonfiction technical type things from a variety of topics. My side of the library is basically just reference material and textbooks, I look up things on Wikipedia pretty regularly, my wife thinks I’m a psychopath. But at this point it’s yes enjoyable but also kind of calming.
Guess my point is that although making me read a dictionary, encyclopedia and random classics that I couldn’t have possibly appreciated from that age anyway was painful at times, it did expose me to a variety of stuff and one of them stuck with me.
My maternal grandfather was an English teacher and his whole basement was like a private library, just rows and rows of books, like borderline hoarding of literature. He instilled a love of reading in my mom. Both of my paternal grandparents always had hardcover books next to their chairs whenever we visited them. Reading to me every night before bed was something both of my parents were very diligent about. My dad in particular read some adventure classics to me, like Robinson Crusoe, Treasure Island, The Hardy Boys detective stories, stuff like that that probably appealed more towards boys than girls. When I got older I started reading his hand-me-down Dirk Pitt and James Bond books, after he’d finished reading them, and then we’d chat about the latest Pitt or Bond adventure. So it became not just about the reading itself, but also about the evening chats and laughs about whatever recent shared story.
My Mom was a teacher and she felt reading was very important. So she encouraged us to read.
I was an odd one for reading. I hated most books. But in fourth grade i read Jurassic Park because of the movie and understood how much better books are than movies. But reading a very complex book at 4th grade made it where other books were boring. So still didn’t read a lot unless it was that level or higher.
If I made too much noise my mom would hit me. So it was the best solution for escape. Also I lived in the middle of nowhere.
This isn’t going to be a useful answer, but I came from a home where my parents had an abusive relationship and were sometimes fairly emotionally neglectful to me, and so I turned to books to get out of the reality I was in and to not be myself for a while. Life was much better in the pages of a novel than it was out here.
My next door neighbor was an elementary school teacher. She gave me old reading books. It’s weird, I don’t remember being taught all that much, I just picked it up. I could read at a third grade level in Kindergarten.
We always had a lot of books in the house when I was a kid and my parents were always reading.
When I’d visit my grandparents houses I’d go through all of their shelves for new books to read too.
Get him the books that he wants. One of the things I’m most grateful for is just that. If I asked for a toy they might say yes, they might say no. If I asked for a book I ALWAYS got it. Take him to your local library too and let him get a library card when he’s old enough.
Parents and grandparents reading to me, and it really paid off. By third grade I was reading at a 12th+ grade reading level. But towards the end of middle school I lost my passion, simply because there weren’t many books written with teen boys as the target audience. Easily 85% of the fiction books in our school library were romance
I’m a high school student and I enjoy reading books on topics that I enjoy such as self improvement, philosophy/stoicism, Neuroscience and other really cool science topics. I do agree with you in my English classes a lot of male students do not enjoy reading.
While I understand what your sentiment is (I’m probably assuming that you’d want more male students to read than what they’re currently digesting in their day to day which I assume is more digital), you do realize that the value of reading, is technically something that can be enjoyed in other mediums as well right
What I mean is, you asked me why I liked reading when I was a kid. It was honestly simple; I wanted entertainment, and it was the only thing I could afford and what was available to me
Books were cheap, libraries were free, and it opened up a world that I never really experienced before
I say this though, just to offer up some food for thought. So okay, let’s go and say, that your goal is to go and have a kid read say, high fantasy like Lord of the Rings
Based on what you’re saying, you’d ideally want them to read the books, enjoy them and read more in that genre
So here’s my question to you: would you take issue if this kid, who overall is wanting to enjoy this world, decided to watch the movies instead?
Or how would you feel if they decided to listen to it via audiobook instead?
Additionally, there’s also a lot of Lord of the Rings video games out there which are faithful to the source material, do you consider this not to be the “real” way that someone is supposed to digest this story?
I bring this up, because I feel like when you say you want people to read (and please, downvote me or call me out if I’m wrong and I’ll delete this), what you’re really saying, is that you don’t want younger kids to be on technology as much as they are currently
Don’t worry, in a lot of ways I agree with you. Screen time is a big problem with kids, and there’s a lot of mindless content that’s out there that doesn’t give them anything of value when they’re done.
But I also hope you realize, that the joy that I had in the 90’s for reading, expanding me into lots of other avenues that I still enjoy to this day
Reading books for example, had me realize that I enjoyed comic books and manga just as much, because I enjoyed the combination of artwork and writing. I enjoyed video games, because it offered up an opportunity to take control over my favorite characters and it was like I was living their story. And movies and TV shows were amazing, because it then meant that I could see stuff I imagined in my head, now shown in real life via a film
Once again, if I’m off-base, I’ll delete this. But I feel like you’re almost making it seem like books are better, and almost like a “lost” art and you want to advocate for them. Which I totally support and keep fighting the good fight
But when you actually asked me where my love of reading came from, I had a take a second and realize that ultimately speaking, I just love a good story and don’t care what medium it’s being told in. So I hope that you realize that the same joy and love from books, can also be applied to a lot of other mediums. And I hope that you don’t view them in a negative light, simply because they’re not a hardback book from a library.
Because when I say I like Lord of the Rings, it means I like more than just the books. I enjoy the films, I enjoy the TV show that recently came out, I enjoy the video games and also enjoy the fan interpretations of it. I enjoy knowing not just the fictional characters, but also the actors who played them. It had me realize that I loved Peter Jackson’s directing and that had me watch more of his movies.
LOTR the book series was the start, but if I feel like it’d be a disservice to advocate only for the books; there’s so much more out there and this applies to a lot of books and series as well
Helps me sleep better.
It’s probably going to be problematic, but Harry potter. My family used to read to me all the time, bed time, for fun during the day, etc. I waa 10 I think when the sorcerers stone came out, and My mom was too impatient for the movie to come out so she jokingly said I should read the book zo I could tell her what happened. It was the first book I ever read on my own and it just captivated me. I think that’s what started it.
There were always books around. Though my Aunt tended to gift me many, my favorite of which from her was “the flat man”, a creepy children’s book. But my parents did great at acquiring and keeping whole series around like the happy hollisters, a complete encyclopedia set and a giant anatomy book with see through pages you could see separate layers of the human body with, tons of Lois LaMour’s and a whole set of zane grey, all of which I really enjoyed. I got stopped by my fourth grade teacher with watership down in the hallway either coming or going one day, she quizzed me to make sure I was actually reading it then congratulated me on tackling such a thick book. That type of encouragement kept me going for quite awhile longer but I completely lost my interest in reading once I figured out I had Aphantasia at age 38.
My mom would take my to the library with her all the time. Part of the fun was going to check out the books on my own and deciding what was cool to read. The other part was spending time with my mom.
My parents also gave me money whenever the scholastic book fair would come around. It was a pretty exciting day for me whenever I got to go and buy some cool new books.
My middle school encouraged students to read, and if we read about 3-5 books within a certain time period and answered basic questions about them (or maybe write a summary, I can’t remember) we would be invited to have a pizza party in the library. As a kid who already liked to read and loved pizza, this was a huge win in my book and I read so many books during the school year, and ate a ton of pizza.
As an adult, I have a kindle and I enjoy the convenience it gives me, but nothing beats a solid, physical book.
I also remember as a kid reading with my mom, or her reading to me.
Sounds like you’re on the right track – definitely keep encouraging your kid and buy them all the books they can handle, even books outside of their age range. Part of the fun for me was reading the more adult themed books like Stephen King when I was 10 or 11. I learned a lot and as a result, have always been a strong reader which has helped me tremendously in school.
I somehow taught myself to read around age 3, but the older I got up until around age 15-16, I read as much as I could, often finishing a book in only a day due to the escapism aspect. I loved being in their world of adventure, mystery, and freedom. I liked the “perfect” endings, no loose ends and everyone got the thing they wanted. It was really cool to me and was better than the computer in many ways
My parents didn’t want to pay for me to do any sports, the kids in my street were all a bit older than me and would bully me, we didn’t have a gaming console or cable t.v. so there really wasn’t anything else but reading and lego. Then when we moved towns to a nice area where the kids were super friendly and there were kids my age in the street, which was great , I stopped reading so much and spent most of my time playing after school with the neighbourhood kids. Then after 6 months we moved again to an even shittier area where the oher 10 year olds were smoking cigarettes and the first thing someone asked me was if I can fight. I wasn’t activelly bullied due to being weirdly strong for my size and having a natural talent for wrestling, but I also had no interest in hanging around with those kids, so the library became my happy place again until I started high school.
Probably not the answer you’re looking for. I try to inspire my sons to read by searching out books that will make them laugh. It’s tough though, one of my sons has apraxia so learning to read has been a huge amount of work for him which I think has taken a lot of the enjoyment out of it. Once he breaks through to being able to read without thinking about it I might be able to find some inspiring books for him.
Definitely parents. Both of them pushed and encouraged it, but dad was the bigger influence. Whether he was on the shitter, his desk, or kitchen, he’d be reading. The same way people scroll on their phones, he’d just whip out a book.
He’d often tell me that the only thing he’d had no questions about, or second thoughts to spend money on for me would be books, that I basically had a blank check when it came to books he’d buy for me.
My mom used to read novels, so I got curious and picked one up and got used to it.
Not having a tv
For me it was just a strong start, My family didn’t read, but for other reason’s I valued escapism.
Hitchhikers guide to the Galaxy & after that I asked for recommendation at a book store & got Good Omens. School sucks the joy out of reading because it be frank, there is nothing more tortuous than reading a book you don’t like or care about.
And even if you *do* like the work keeping pace with the class can be hell be it too fast or too slow.
… I’m actually in a bad mood now remembering all those years. I swear public school could make a fat kid hate cake.
Books in school are so political now I hope things haven’t gotten worse. Young people are all idealists & can tell when something is wrong. A little coercion & soul crushing demoralization tends to suck the joy out of reading.
It sounds dramatic, but everything is dramatic when you are young & it’s your first time.
I liked to live in fantasy and had a rich imagination
My father was emotionally absent, BUT he told my mom that she should buy me any books I ever wanted. So I grew up with a lot of books in my house, my mom would take me to the library whenever I asked and books were where I would go to get away from my dysfunctional home.
escapism, I was looking to do anything and everything to survive my home environment growing up, as a result I went through a lot of different mediums looking for stories to get lost in and pretend I wasn’t me for a while and one of those mediums happened to be books (particularly fantasy), the further away a story felt from my real life the better, in adulthood I just do it for fun but it was definitely a matter of survival when I was younger
Watching Sesame Street
Someone gave me The Hobbit & The Lord of the Rings for my 6th birthday, and Tolkien made a book nerd out of me.
As for my toddler, they also love books, but we’re not forcing them on him. We just normalize reading by doing so ourselves. Kids tend to take an interest in things mom and dad find interesting.
Books didnt make fun of me.
Fuck knows. It’s not hereditary.
I had a pretty lonely childhood so I escaped into books. Doubtful I would have survived otherwise.
Playboy
Good question. I’m not really sure.
I know my mom read to me most every night. I remember the first chapter book I read. (Still have it). I just always loved to read.