Is Forcing Boys to Read the Answer?

EDITOR'S NOTE

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Work in progress:

Research has proven that over 50% of boys by the time they reach grade two hate reading. From personal experience as a professional storyteller in schools, I would say that 50% is being generous. Forcing boys to read is usually fruitless and in most cases increases a child's dislike for reading.

The question is, how do we encourage boys to read?

The obvious answer is to read to them, read to them often, and read books by as many authors and on as many topics as possible.

You don't have to buy books, though by doing so, you support the authors who write them. Most public library can satisfy any reading need your child has.

But what if your child doesn't like to read? What then?

• Choose topics that interest him
• Read to his favourite stuffed animal or toy, even if it's a transformer
• Read in his favourite place in the house
• Try to discover his favourite time to read and if possible read to him then
• Talk about the story
• Tell the story in your own way
• Ask your chuild how he would like the story to end
• Tell him personal stories about when you were his age
• If you aren't a reader but love to sing, sing to him
• If you love art, cars, or mountain climbing find pictures of your favourite hobby and describe to him what you see and feal
• If written material on your hobby is too complicated for him to understand, choose short phrases or sentences to read 
• Make time for you to read for yourself, your child may follow your lead

Whatever you do, make reading a happy and intimate experience between you and your son, and for that matter for you and your daughter as well.

As Albert Einstein once said, “If you want your children to be intelligent, read them fairy tales. If you want them to be more intelligent, read them more fairy tales.”


For more Reading:
Encouraging Boys to Read

Bashful Bob and Doleful Dorinda

Bashful Bob and Doleful Dorinda Written by Margaret Atwood. Illustrated by Dušan Petričić. Toronto, ON: Key Porter Kids, 2004. 32 pp., cloth, $21.95. ISBN 1-55263-609-7. Grades 1-5 / Ages 6-10.

Alliteration playfully punctuates Margaret Atwood's peppy picture book, Bashful Bob and Doleful Dorinda.

Bashful Bob is "abandoned in a basket" and thinks he is a dog. Doleful Dorinda's parents "disappear in a dreadful disaster" leaving her "dumped on distant relatives."

Free the Dragons / A Step Back

Sometimes we have to step back to step forward.

A Step Back

Hi, my name is Max Tell. This is part two of my series of personal stories,
"Free the Dragons". Have you faced your dragons today? 

Part Two: A Step Back Is One Step from Stepping Forward

Free the Dragons / Skydiving Baby

The amazing story of my first flight into the unknown.

Skydiving Baby Have you faced your dragons today? This is Max Tell with my series of personal stories, "Kill the Dragons". Episode One: Skydiving Baby

Free the Dragons / Intro 2

What is a dragon?

Introductions 2 Hi, my name is Robert Stelmach, a.k.a. Max Tell. I am here not really to kill my dragons, but to face them. I'm also here to inspire you to face yours, or to help you to protect the children in your care from the dragons that haunt them. What is a dragon?

Free the Dragons / Intro 1

Why I created this podcast.

Introduction 1 Hello, my name is Max Tell. I am a writer, storyteller, singer, songwriter, and educator. I've wanted to create my own podcast for quite a while now. Now that I'm sitting here, it doesn't seem so easy.

Free the Dragons / Index

Max Tell: I have had problems with learning all my life. I have a 55 percentile short term memory capacity, making memorization a constant struggle. As a child, my difficulties with memorizing lead me to fear both reading and writing, for they seemed so far out of my reach. Yet I fell in love with language through song and that changed my life.

Table of Contents

Here you will find links to my healing story Free the Dragons, a
series of podcasts and blog posts outlining how falling in love with
language changed my life.

Please note, I changed the title of this series several times in the early
stages of this process and did not come up with a solid title until story
2 A Step Back.

Intro 1

Intro 2

1 Skydiving Baby

2 A Step Back

A Cup Well Over Three Quarters Full: Max Tell's Story

Max Tell's Story: Max Tell's Personal Voyage from a belief that his cup is half empty to it being well over three quarters full.

Introduction

Hello, my name is Max Tell. I am a writer, storyteller, singer, songwriter, and educator. I've wanted to create my own podcast for quite a while now. Now that I'm sitting here, it doesn't seem so easy.

READ.LEARN.GROW

Boys Reading: A Lesson From Cinderella? Alexandra Morrill

"...as early as second grade, fully 25 percent (of boys) had developed a negative attitude about reading." (Trelease, p.156). For two essential strategies to help encourage boys to read click here.

Let's Go Reading in the Car One

Sunday Book Review

Try some summer reading in the car with an audio book list provided by Judith Shulevitz.

Published: May 18, 2012

How did we human beings become the hypersocial creatures we are today?
The biologist E. O. Wilson credits fire, among other causes. In a recent history of human evolution, Wilson offers the following explanation: Fire was precious because it flushed animals out of the brush, then made it possible for people to cook them. Campfires had to be guarded, which made them like “nests” and made us feel safe enough to be “eusocial” or altruistic. Sounds plausible to me. More . .  .

Let's Go Reading In The Car Two

Try some summer reading in the car with a list provided by Judith Shulevitz.

Monday, May 21, 2012

Summer Audio Books

The New York Times Book Review section from May 20th featured an article by Judith Shulevitz, “Let’s Go Reading in the Car” that included the following list of recommended audiobooks to check out this summer. Read reviews for these titles with CLCD.

Benefits of Telling Stories

Storytelling is the giving of a gift, the sharing of an emotion, the passing on of knowledge and understanding, one to the other.

Storytelling helps to facilitate learning without the burden of having to teach.  Story can be based on legend, myth, history, or even on science, mathematics, music, or the family.

A Touch of the Child in Us All

Let the child in you run free!

More of Zerbin - New Earth

Fantasy Literature

Fantasy Literature: Life's too short to read bad books. Read more…

Journaling Buddies

Journaling, Writing Ideas, Creative Writing, Journal Prompts, Award-Winning Girl Dairy and Boy Diary. Read more…

Webzine: Middle School Students

Do you want to write? Do you want to become a better writer? Do you want to learn how to get published? Here's a website just for you. Read more ...

A Gift From Music

Robert (Max Tell) Stelmach When I was young, I hated and feared books. I have a short term memory problem, perhaps as a result of falling out of a two-story window when a baby.

Politically Incorrect

Monkey See Monkey Do Because of a general feeling among many parents and teacher that some topics are politically incorrect for toddlers and young children, I have been thinking about re-writing a few nursery rhymes such as Three Blind Mice, perhaps as follows:

Reaching For Gold

Too often teachers, parents, and students focus only on grades. Grades are important, absolutely, but they should never be one's primary or single goal. In terms of writing, why do we write? Or why should we write? Before answering, let me ask another question: why do we talk to one another? To communicate.

So, what should be our goal in writing? 

The Gift of Reading

At a very early age, it was obvious; Robert Anderson wasn’t good school material. His grade one teacher used a ping-pong pallet to coax him to read. His first of two grade two teachers used a yardstick with the same intension. Neither worked. Robert failed grade two and three. His grade eight principal told him, “Don’t waste your time. Liberal Arts is not for you.  You’ll never graduate from high school, let alone university.” Robert proved him wrong, but not until he jumped a few difficult hurdles.

Tribute to Dr Seuss

And Early Childhood Literacy Dr. Seuss, Read Across America and 25 words your toddler should know is a short tribute to Dr. Seuss and his lifetime work to encourage literacy in young children in fun and imaginative ways. More

Highlights:

A third of all parents believe other people, such as teachers, are the ones who affect their children’s learning the most. Teachers are important, but they can’t do it all themselves. I would add that the contribution of parents during a child's early years is far more important than suggested here, and that parents reading to their young children are the actual key to literacy. Parents help built the foundation, while teachers help build the house.

The American Academy of Pediatricians suggests parents instill a love for books and language from the very beginning by reading, rhyming, singing and talking with babies from birth. Children learn best through repetition and interaction with their parents.

Rand Whipple

Early Learning Residency at York Day Nursery

Canadian Poems for Canadian Kids

Canadian Poems for Canadian Kids Edited by Jen Hamilton Illustration by Merrill Fearon Subway Books ISBN: 0-9736675-0-9 May not still be available except at your public library, or Amazon.ca Poetry / Humour / Thoughful For Grade 2 - 3

Beyond Words

Teaching without Pressuring the Teacher to Teach or the Child to Learn Stories and songs are natural teachers and create natural paths to literacy. Stir a child’s imagination with stories, songs, and poems, and you feed the roots of their learning. Once memorized, a single sentence from a piece of prose, a song, or a poem, creates a model for many hundreds of sentences to come.

Failure a Means to Success

Michael Jordan “I've missed more than 9,000 shots in my career. I've lost almost 300 games. 26 times I've been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I've failed over and over and over again in my life and that is why I succeed.” - Michael Jordan.

Recently on CBC Radio, I heard a discussion between the renowned Michael Enright, host of CBC’s Sunday Edition, and three prominent and concerned educators. The subject for discussion was whether or not the current policy of ‘not failing students’ is ruining their possibilities in later life.

Where would we be today without failure and the subsequent success that failure can lead to? Would we have the telephone, space travel, or modern medicine? Most great scientific and technical advancements have been made because of years and years of trial and error.