Children will read if they see Mum and Dad doing it.

When I read statements like this “The Telegraph”  headline, I can’t help but wonder, is it true?
 
My beach bum father was brought up by English speaking parents in a beachside town and was little more than a functional illiterate although both his parents were literate. He could read road signs, sign his name, read the headlines of papers if he concentrated and the TV guide, but picking up a book to read for the pure pleasure of it?  Read me a bedtime story? Never happened.

My mother was raised by dirt poor Polish immigrant parents in an English speaking country who were fully illiterate in both languages. Not even newspapers that were stacked hip deep in the corner of the kitchen were read; they were used as an outer wrapper for the cartons of eggs they sold to the neighborhood to make ends meet. School was the only place in which books were ever read to her. As an adult Mum would borrow books from the library every few weeks; staggering under the weight of a stack of books from the library door to the car. It was a weekly routine that my mother would go to the news agency every Monday to buy her three favourite magazines, which were devoured over the course of the week. 

Potentially the chances of me turning out to be a bookworm were 50-50. Obviously it only takes a moment to look at this blog’s themes to know that I agree with the statement that if children see even one parent reading they too will read. And I applaud British MP Michael Gove taking a stand and setting the goal of getting children to read 50 books a year.
 
Seriously folks, that’s less than one book a week. There is talk about people’s attention span being reduced due to the social media swirl that everyone seems seduced by. Tweets are only 140 characters (characters – not words!) long. Instant gratification or it’s given the flick. Heaven knows my posts are probably too long according to the rules governing how to develop a popular blog. 

    In this household we don’t own any gaming machines, although Bronwen’s  father does play games on his computer that she enjoys in small doses and she does love going to a friend’s house and playing on the Wii Fit. This past week I’ve introduced her to chapter books, reading “The  Wishing Chair Collection” (Enid Blyton) to her at night. We go to the library truck every week and load up my backpack to the point that the zippers strain to close. Sitting together on the floor next to the ‘library bookshelf’ and reading several picture books is a normal event. Have you ever read “Jake Goes Peanuts” by Micheal Wright to a child…? See if you can guess a six year olds favourite page.  I’ll give you a hint; there’s toilet humor in it!

I cannot imagine a life without books, without reading. I cannot imagine missing the pleasure of being taken to another life via the imagination of a good writer. Not sharing this joy, this affordable form of entertainment with my child seems a weird idea that my mind cannot wrap itself around. The idea that Victoria Beckham admitted that she hadn’t read a book in her whole life fills me with a kind of terror.

Asking the question ‘do you read to your children? Are they readers too?’ seems too simplified.  Do you think that parents reading to their children, or just being seen to be reading has an effect on the attitude children take to reading themselves? Is the goal of 50 books a year impossible, too easy or just plain ridiculous?  And how, if shrinking attention spans are true, do we make reading more attractive to not only children, but people of all ages?

PS. My laptop computer has died so if entries are few and far between over the next little while, its because I’m going spare, looking for an affordable replacement, writing sporadically on Bronwen’s fathers computer and suffering withdrawl  without my instantly gratifying window to the world and all things literary.

Related posts:

1. You Wouldnt Read About It…..
2. Something Amis about Writing for Children