Comments on: Read Aloud Time: How Do You Stack Up?

By: Jill R.

Jill R. — Mon, 08 Jun 2015 16:43:08 +0000

Reading daily is important I think!

Thank you for stopping by the Thoughtful Spot Weekly Blog Hop this week. We hope to see you drop by our neck of the woods next week!

By: Heather

Heather — Sun, 07 Jun 2015 00:07:48 +0000

In reply to Sadia. Thanks for your insight. I used to teach at a high poverty middle school, and we had a lot of families like you describe. We also had families who, despite challenges, made reading and schoolwork a priority. When I sent home a low grade on a progress report, I always worried over the children whose parents didn't follow up with me for their requested conferences. Fortunately, we had a great staff and were able to provide a lot of support at school.

Anyway, the main reason I mentioned the assumed demographics of my survey sample is that I wanted to be clear that it wasn't representative of the population at large. I would guess it does reflect my readers, though.

Perhaps we should band together and work to support organizations that support early literacy in high risk children.

By: Sadia

Sadia — Sat, 06 Jun 2015 21:28:21 +0000

I suspect that your peers are self-selected to value education and have the "luxury" of reading time. I see an interesting cross-section of the community in my daughters' public school dual language program. The children from English-speaking homes tend to have very involved, highly educated parents who advocated for their children to be in the program. We all tend to have at least 100 children's books in our homes and regularly visit the local library. Many of the Spanish-speaking families' children ended up in the program by default and deal with far more economic hardship, often having to work multiple jobs. Some of the parents are functionally illiterate. For them, reading with their children every day, something you and I take for granted, may be impossible. If you look at the statistics, it's shocking to realize how many families can't afford/don't have even one age-appropriate book in the home for their children. It was so odd, coming from an academic home, to visit my in-laws for the first time and realize that they owned only 4 books, among them a dictionary, thesaurus, and Bible. My living room, on the other hand, is built around our bookshelves. For some parents, 3 times a week may very well be a stretch. The rest of us don't need the reminder!

Thanks for linking with #TwinklyTuesday.

By: Heather

Heather — Sat, 06 Jun 2015 06:59:07 +0000

In reply to Amanda.

I hear you about reading over housework! That's great that you're able to fit in so much reading. Now that my kids are a bit older, at bedtime we go by the clock rather than the number of books. We all have a hard time finding a stopping place – the downside of picking great books. It was easier back in the days of a certain number of books!

By: Amanda

Amanda — Sat, 06 Jun 2015 03:21:05 +0000

Like others said, my daughter (and my son is catching on) knows it is hard for me to say no to reading time so throughout the day we will read aloud 3-5 books. At bedtime we read again and we have to cap the girl at 3 books or else she'll keep us up all night! The boy is also starting to push for his book choices so we'll probably be upping the reading to either 6 books (3 his, 3 hers or 4 – 2 each). My daughter also likes chapter books so I have been reading books that I like aloud during Lego or Playdough or breakfast. I love to read, so working it into our daily life has not been hard…neglecting other things like dishes and laundry in favor of reading is what I struggle with!

Visiting from Shine Blog Hop #50

By: Cami Hall

Cami Hall — Thu, 04 Jun 2015 21:18:42 +0000

I love this post! I'm all for helping parents read more to their children by providing practical solutions to work it into their busy lives! Great ideas here!

By: Heather

Heather — Thu, 04 Jun 2015 19:45:53 +0000

In reply to Erin @ Nourishing My Scholar.

We sometimes have days like that too. I imagine everyone does. It helps us that the kids expect (demand!) books at a certain time every day, but on school nights bedtime trumps even reading time if they're clearly sleepy. I'm so glad it's summer now!

By: Erin @ Nourishing My Scholar

Erin @ Nourishing My Scholar — Thu, 04 Jun 2015 18:09:52 +0000

I try to read to my kids several times per day, but there are some days that I don't read at all due to the business of our schedules.

By: Heather

Heather — Tue, 02 Jun 2015 07:50:25 +0000

In reply to Emma. My kids have figured out that's a good way to get my attention too!

I spent some time looking for evidence-based research on this subject, but wasn't able, at least in my time available, to dig up a magic number.

By: Emma

Emma — Sun, 31 May 2015 07:52:10 +0000

I read a book from about 20 years ago that recommended reading just a few times a week. Ideally every parent would read several times a day. My daughter learned young that whatever I was doing, if she asked to read a book I would almost always stop to do it!