Read to your kids

This blog post is less about raising Lily, who is 6 months old today! (amazingly, to her father and me, who look into her bed at night and are astonished to see, not the tiny baby that was surely there just yesterday, but a beautiful SIX MONTH OLD. Tomorrow I will turn around and she will be too old to hold my hand, to tuck in at night and kiss all over every day.) And more about something that is dear to my heart.

If you stand still long enough, or even if you are trying to run away, my grandma will have a story to share with you. One she is very fond of is my family's hard work at instilling a love of reading in me at a very young age. She especially loves to tell how my poppy would tell me stories in bed at night, straight out of his own imagination and would read to me at every opportunity, spiriting me away to book stores when Grandma was pursuing her favourite sport, clothes shopping. By the time I was 3, I could read. It was gift that has given more to me than any other.

When Lily was born, I was determined that she should receive the same priceless gift from her father and I. Even in the NICU we would read to her. Beatrix Potter's Jemima Puddleduck was the first book we ever read to her. It took her a long time to actually like books, listen to them, and enjoy them. When she was almost 4 months old, she enjoyed her very first book, Eric Carle's The Very Hungry Caterpillar.

She hasn't looked back since.

Lily is fairly passive about things, she likes people, but things, she could take or leave. She loves books though. She kicks her legs, and laughs and wriggles when you get a book out, and she remains excited, no matter how long it is. She has lasted through Winnie-the-Pooh stories and whole Dr Seuss books. She LOVES Dr Seuss and Lynley Dodd (Hairy Maclary, for those philistines out there) and rather enjoys Dora the Explorer. There is NOT A SINGLE DAY that goes by where we don't read at least one book, and most days we read two, and many days three.

And here's where I get preachy. READ TO YOUR KIDS. No matter if their butts are in disposable or cloth, the food in their belly is organic or not, they are immunised (or, dare I say, not) or they can watch TV during down time. No matter which way you lean for the dozens of things that parents are told to do and not do in never ending circles, READ TO YOUR KIDS.

Recently, the Queensland government implemented a programme where every child would be given a book at birth. The whole reasoning can be found here. But, the basics are that horrific numbers of five year olds, around 48% were not regularly read to at home, which was leading to poor literacy skills in similar numbers of children. It was decided that parents just needed a bit of encouragement, and the Books for Bubs programme was born!

90% of children who are poor readers at the end of Year 1 are poor readers at the end of Year 4. If a child is disengaged from learning at age 8, it is very difficult to get them back on track, and reading is often key to this disengagement. Just 20 minutes a day can make all the difference.

Some words from Mem Fox: Ten Read Aloud Commandments

It takes around 1000 books to teach your child to read, which is just 3 a day over the course of a year. So read to your kids. It is the greatest gift they will ever receive from you.

EDIT: Bob reminded me of two things, which reminded me of a third. The first is a story. The day I got my weaning books, Bob sat down with Lily on his lap and started to flick through one. Not reading, just looking, and Lily go so excited, she start kicking and gurgling, expecting to be read to. So he did. She loved it! Also, he reminded me of this gem: children will learn to love reading if they see you doing it. So read whenever you can as well. You wouldn't tell your child to brush their teeth and eat their veggies and not do it yourself. Same goes for reading. And finally, a love of reading instills a life long love of learning, and no matter what you say about school success not being intrinsically connected to life long success, the road is 100% easier if the child loves to learn, and is good at learning, and reading is key to setting their feet on this path.