The February, 2015 Family Fun magazine shared an article on encouraging kids to read. The two ideas I liked the best were (1) a family book talk and (2) a reading incentive program.
(1) The article suggests each member of the family share their leisure books during a family book talk. I like the idea, but would also suggest having everyone read and share the kids’ books. That will reinforce the value of their wordless, picture, beginning reader, chapter book, etc. for the youngest child. I always find interesting bits when I read to kids so why not expand the Family Fun magazine idea and ask everyone to read and talk about the youngest kidlets’ books? It may give them more incite into what they read. What do you think?
(2)The Family Fun reading incentive plan has a great twist. Each family member sets a goal for the number of books each plans to read in one year. (You could also break that down to monthly goals for the youngest kids.) Families then donate one penny or a nickel to a favored charitable group or library for each book that is read.
In the article, two brothers read 1,000 books (all different titles) and presented their local library with $230.00 If the family donates one cent for each book read, it could be a great donation. Having a reading incentive plan also sets up a family reading hour and that is a fantastic goal!
What ideas do you have to add to these two? I bet we can come up with a dozen.
Send me what you think works to encourage reading and I’ll post the results next month. Until then, Happy Reading!