Giving the Gift of Reading

Last month I received an e-mail about the results of a reading study done by the National Endowment for the Arts. They gathered results from more than 40 studies of children, teens and adults in the United States. These studies took into account all forms of reading materials. What they found were disturbing, although not all together new, results.

Their results showed that Americans, as a society, are:

1. Reading less

2. Reading less well

The study goes on to explain the effects poor reading skills are having on young Americans as they go to enter the workforce. Get the whole story on this reading survey, it's just a few pages, or you can look at the full 98 page report. Our nation's reading was also recently discussed on NPR. I thought this program was really, really good. It's only about 30 minutes and will be well worth your time - Listen to the NPR program now.

It's hard to find time to get everything done in today's world, especially when you have kids to care for and take from place to place. Sometimes at the end of the day we don't want to do anything but get the kids to bed and then get there ourselves. But have we stopped to think what an extra 20 minutes to read bedtime stories might mean to our kids? What reading the next chapter in our book or that interesting article in the newspaper might mean to us as well as our children?

Reading is a basic skill that we all need, and need to be able to do well, in order to make it through life with greater ease and to be more successful in the things we choose to do. With a study reporting that we are reading less - and less well - than our counterparts 20 years ago, shouldn't we see what we can do to correct this deficiency?

I know it's not as simple as taking a supplement. Don't we all wish it was. We have so many things to take our attention. We have work, social activities, family time, television, internet, music, games, and how the list could go on. In our society we push to do everything, in many cases we feel expected to do everything, and there is never enough time in a day. But if reading for a few minutes each day would help make you or your children more successful, wouldn't you think it was worth the time? Is it just a question of deciding what our priorities are? A few month ago our children's librarian posted very good article on reading to your child for 20 minutes a day. With our society show signs of a literacy deficiency, isn't it worth it?

And why not make it something fun for you and the kids. Reading doesn't have to be a chore. Like anything, we are all more likely to stick with something if we think it's fun. Make reading fun! Let you child see that you enjoy it. And have fun reading together. Recently I left a little blank book for my niece, she's been learning how to read and write - and she loves it. She carries around notebooks to write in and come up with math problems for you to solve. I knew she'd love this little freebie I'd picked up. The next morning when I saw her she brought it over to me and opened it up to the first page where she'd drawn a picture and written the words "I thikn I can and" she read the read the words to me and then pointed to the picture "and I'm reading!" she said excitedly. It was a picture of her reading a book. I love her excitement for reading and I hope she can keep it for the rest of her life. Wouldn't it be nice if we could share the love of reading with everyone.

It may be hard for us to introduce a lot of people to reading, but we can each do a little. Box Elder County has a literacy program and at times they need literacy tutors. Schools and church organizations sometimes look for help in teaching children and/or adults how to read, or to help individuals increase their reading ability. Don't have a lot of time? Start it simple. Read yourself. Read with your kids. If you develop, or increase your love of reading, your kids will see it. If your kids see it they'll want to find out what it's all about. If they find a love of reading their friends will see it. Get them hooked early, before all the diversions of the teen years bombard them. This Christmas encourage Santa to leave a book in the stocking next to that iPod or Wii. This Christmas give them the gift of reading!

Elizabeth