A Different Kind of Recipe: Recipe for Raising Readers

My First Book

Sorry, but today I don't have a regular kind of recipe. I hope you are not too disappointed with me. Rather than give a recipe, I wanted to ask you for yours.

Often I have wondered where the love of reading comes from. Is there a "recipe" for raising good readers? How can we whet childrens' appetites for books and turn them into good readers? Does it get handed down from parents to children? Or, is it merely a matter of parents reading to infants and toddlers as parenting books tell us? Is it mainly the job of schools and educators to foster a love for books in children?

I can only speak for myself. I suppose in my case, the love for reading did not come through my parents. They were not great readers themselves. I never saw my parents read books. My dad only read the paper. My parents never took us to a library to check out books, nor did they - except for the standard Grimm fairy tale edition owned by every German household - read to us. I figure my mom, who had not much schooling, did the best she could by reading fairy tales to us.

There were certainly lots of books around our house when I was growing up in Germany. My mom had acquired an eclectic selection of novels via membership of a mail order book club in her pre-married life. My dad's books were mostly antique tomes about religion and history, some with fancy covers that would make you want to leaf through and admire the beautiful pictures. Dad's books were mostly printed in old German type and not accessible to a young child even after I had learned to read. I also distinctly remember a book with pictures from WWI and WWII. I am not sure why this horrible book sat around on one of the lower shelves. It certainly made an impression on me as a young child.

So maybe osmosis - by being surrounded by a number of books - was a factor, since there wasn't much encouragement to read on my parents' part. I recall my love for reading started in first grade. It was then that I bought my first book with my own money. I had saved up my allowance to purchase a book of fairy tales printed in cursive. In those days, German kids were taught to read and write in cursive. We were never allowed to print letters. I surely loved learning to make those curly letters, my lessons in Schoenschreiben (transl. writing prettily = penmenship), and my first book that I could read by myself.

This Schneider-book belongs to Ulla

Maybe books were my way to escape the reality of a not-so-happy childhood. The Catholic girls' school I attended from 5th through 13th grade had a fairly small library with juvenile fiction tucked away under a stairwell somewhere. Only the older kids could use the "real" library while the younger students were limited to the "stairwell library" run by the nuns. It was the strangest little library you can imagine, but I read every book in it. I cannot recall ever being bored in my childhood. How could you be bored when there were so many great books to read?

It's harder these days for me to find time for reading. After a long day of doing chores around the house, running around to activities, taking care of the kids, crafting, and working on the computer, one gets too tired to read at night. Is that how my parents felt? Usually, I fall asleep after a few pages.

However, we try to set a good example for our kids. We make regular trips to the library and have done so since they were infants and old enough to attend story time events. Yet, I find it terribly hard to compete with the thrills of modern electronic devices these days. There was no Nintendo to tempt me, no computer screen calling to play evermore addictive games, no cellphone, XBox nor Wii. In a way it was much easier for a child in the 1970s to become a reader.

Maybe it would be easiest to ban all those things from one's house completely. I think we are the only parents in my kids' class who don't own a Wii. But how can I forbid them to play with the computer, when the children see me sit and work at my computer every day? So I see my role as parent mainly as a guide and role model. I try to set a good example by limiting my own computer time. I try to steer them away from screen time as much as possible - less than 1 hour per day.

Have you tried to do a family reading night? I know after a very busy day it seems so much easier to turn on the TV or pop in a movie. But really if you tried, you might find that sitting together reading books a couple of nights a week may be more relaxing....

What's the last book you have read? With or without children? For Christmas, my son gave me the bestselling books (see picture)by Stieg Larson. I really got into them on one of our "family reading nights" and read them in less than a week's time. Looks like Ulla-the- voracious- childhood-reader is back! Any book suggestions for me?

Please, share your recipe with us! We need the perfect one. I think our recipe worked for our son, but we are struggling with our daughter who has not shown much interest in books and has a hard time finishing books. How do you cater to the different appetites of people? I'd really appreciate your thoughts on this one!