Summer Reading Successes

It always amazes me when the end of summer approaches. While some of the days feel long, it often feels like it comes to an end so quickly. This summer we were so busy that the time flew by. We loved having more time for visits to museums, libraries, and even a small wildlife preserve. We hope you have had some fun experiences too!

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While we were busy, we also had plenty of time to read. My kids discovered several new series that kept them reaching for books throughout the summer (thanks to knowledgeable librarians and booksellers). For my rising second grader, she has loved reading the Amelia Bedelia and Nancy Clancy chapter books. She has loved Fancy Nancy and Amelia Bedelia as characters for a long time and now she has the chance to experience them as older characters in a more sophisticated way. I love that because she has had experiences with them before, she knows a bit about how the characters will behave (which can be tricky when reading about Amelia Bedelia’s misunderstandings).

Our summer included many trips to the bookstore and libraries in our area. I am trying to take advantage of presentations and experiences our local libraries and bookstores offer. This summer we were able to attend story time that included an opportunity to paint with straws (which my kids loved!!). We also attended a presentation on graphic novels at our local bookstore and now we are exploring many new books that we would have never even looked at before. I have subscribed to receive emails from the public library and several different bookstores so that we can continue to participate in literacy-encouraging activities around town.

This summer, we also let our experiences fuel our reading to learn more. For example, my daughter attended horseback riding camp this summer (a great gift from my parents – we love experiential gifts at our house). She was a little nervous about the camp because she doesn’t have a lot of experience with horses. She had several nonfiction books about horses that she received as gifts a few years ago so we pulled those out and read them so she would be familiar with the terminology. I knew she would be in camp with experienced riders and kids who already took lessons so I didn’t want her to be completely overwhelmed.

I also introduced her to my favorite reading series when I was a child: The Saddle Club by Bonnie Bryant. I remember devouring these books as a kid and loving the equestrian adventures of Lisa, Carole, and Stevie. These books were a little hard and she was so excited to read them that we decided to get them as ebooks. We checked out the first Saddle Club ebook from our local library. She loved it! So I ended up purchasing the next two ebooks through Barnes and Noble. Reading these books gave my daughter more information about the experience of riding. While these books are fictional, Bonnie Bryant, used technical terms and provided nice examples and/or definitions for many of these terms. With the Saddle Club books and her nonfiction books, my daughter was much more prepared for horse camp and we all believe it made for a much more positive experience for her. Surprisingly, she was excited to revisit her nonfiction books to show me images of what she had learned about at camp. This one camp inspired many hours of reading this summer.

Often our adventures continued to fuel reading after our visits. After visiting the small wildlife preserve, my son wanted to read all about tigers and lions. He found all of our books about big cats and requested that we read them. He was excited to see photographs that looked like the animals he saw at the wildlife preserve and he loved knowing even more about these fascinating creatures. His interest continued and prompted a trip to the library to see what wildlife books they had available.

The thing I loved about our summer reading this summer is that I never had to say, “you need to read.”

Some of the things we do to motivate reading in authentic ways (during summer and the school year):

– Use many opportunities to encourage and prompt reading. (for example, reading more about tigers after visiting TigerWorld or simply finding a range of books about a topic your child is interested in)

– Take advantage of library visits and bookstore visits to not only get books but learn too. Subscribe to their newsletters to learn about experiences they offer during the summer and on weekends.

– Talk to your librarian or bookseller to get recommendations for new books.

– Encourage your child to try a new series.

– Encourage your child to read books based on their favorite TV shows. (My son loves the Wild Kratts books and now loves the show.)

– Establish and maintain reading habits like nightly reading habit before bed.

Due to their inquisitive nature and finding series they loved, my kids naturally wanted to read or be read to throughout the summer. We read way more than the six recommended books this summer and instead of the summer slide, my children’s reading improved. We didn’t do any worksheets. I never forced them to read. I never asked them the typical follow-up questions like setting, main character, and so on. We read and we talked and we made connections to our lives and other stories we know. When my kids want to know more about something we turn to books (we also ask Alexa (on our Amazon Echo) but sometimes her answers are a little too sophisticated for my kids).

As the new school year begins, we will continue to make reading a priority and set up systems for homework (like we did last year which you can read about here) and reading. We will continue to allow time to honor their reading choices and preferences to maintain reading motivation. Let me know how you encourage and support reading with less time.

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