Raising a reader

I'm sure it comes as no surprise that I would like Matthew to become a reader.

There have been lots of articles written about how reading to your children improves behavior and attention and that "reading also strengthens children’s social, emotional, and character development" and even make them "empathetic citizens of the world". And sure, I am a little skeptical of some of the studies done (trying to do Emily Oster proud*) but of course, I love reading so why not have some official sounding reasons to try to pass this on to the little one?

But ultimately, I would say my desire to instill a love of reading in Matthew is far more selfish and self-centered. I like reading (obviously) and I would like Matthew to share this hobby.

And thus I have been reading to him since basically day one. Or at least, day one home from the hospital.**

Now, that very early reading mostly involved me reading out loud what I myself was reading. Everything I had read that stressed the importance of reading to your baby, even a newborn, said what you read was not so important, but just that you were reading to them. I hope the content was not very important because the books I read those first few weeks included:

Working Stiff by Judy Melineck which was a memoir about her time as medical examiner in NYC
Assassination Vacation by Sarah Vowell about presidential assassinations
Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter by Seth Grahame-Smith which is about...well the title says it all, doesn't it?

I didn't give much thought to those titles beyond looking for something I had read before that I had a digital copy of so that I could easily read it on my phone.

I read to him a bit from other books I was reading, but after this I started expanding into actual children's books, thanks to generous gifts from many friends as well as my mom saving my own children's books from when I and my brother were younger. I read a variety of books to him, but it leaned heavily towards Dr. Seuss because I enjoyed them and I have to read them. And he isn't expressing much of an opinion just yet. Most of the reading time was done while he was laying on his activity mat or later in his jumper, so he was hardly paying rapt attention. But still.

As he got a bit older, and you'd think reading would pick, I actually started to dial it back. Not something I was intending but his mobility increased and the idea of sitting in one spot for any length of time was abhorrent. Books with normal paper pages (like 95% of the children's book I had) were in constant danger of having pages ripped out and reading from board books was difficult when they would instantly find their way into his mouth. He has a few soft books, which he's a big fan of, but I can't say the story in them is their main point of attraction. I would still try here and there to read to him, but it wasn't the same as before.

Eventually our collecting of board books, especially lift-the-flap board books, began to grow and the interactive nature of those lift books became more intriguing so I was able to keep his attention a bit longer when reading a book. And books were finally welcomed into the bedtime routine.

But the happiest book moment with him (so far) came when he grabbed a book off his shelf, ran over to me and plopped himself in my lap. Now he wasn't just tolerating me reading to him while he wanted to do something else, but actually wanted me to read to him.

And so, most mornings, I'll read a couple books to him. Sure, they're usually the same books every day but he enjoys them. I try to suggest others but the more successful way to have him branch out is when he pulls a different book off the shelf. Sure, he pulls a different book out cos it was sticking out slightly more. But I find he's slowly warming up to these.

Hopefully this early reading will mean a love of books later. And all of those other benefits wouldn't be terrible either. If he doesn't like books? Well, that's my disappointment to deal with.

If you're curious, these are his current favorites

*Oh, you're saying her name is NOT instantly recognizable? Ridiculous. Anyway, she's written books on pregnancy and early childhood that are all about looking into the various studies done, checking out which ones are junk, which are good but may have some problems and which are sound, and presenting all of the data so that you, oh dear reading, can make an informed decision. So basically, looking into the studies and trying to understand causation vs correlation is something I hope she appreciates.

**Given my hospital stay was a bit longer than initially anticipated, and my emotional energy tapped out at "vaguely staring at a blank wall" for a couple days, I didn't do much reading there.

Kids Books, I Have Thoughts

Since the little guy came along, I've been reading a lot more kids books. Because obviously I'm reading to him already. And we have lots of children's books due to excellent gift choices from friends and family AND the fact that my mom saved our children's books. I've already gone through 2 of those boxes and have a few more to dig through so there will be many books for the boy and right now the biggest problem is lack of bookshelf space. So far I have a large stack of Dr. Seuss books and dinosaur books. So many dinosaur books. Really hope he's into dinosaurs because that is definitely a theme in these books (And clothes. And music.*)

No dinos here, but look at this face

But here's something I've come to realize reading a bunch of children's books out loud after not having done that for many years: a lot of these books are so bad.

There are those that aren't great in terms of content. So far I haven't come across any in our collection that are SUPER terrible but there are pieces of some that I'm like "perhaps we'll skip this section". Or some that are just outdated in terms of facts (turns out dino books from the '70s don't have the whole evolution thing down yet). Or the Berenstain Bears book about how everyone is either a "he" or a "she" that maybe we won't be reading.

There are those stories that don't have the most...exciting plots, but I'm not worried about those. Tell me all about animals on a farm or about picking up a friend at the airport**.

But the books that bother me the most are the ones that are just poorly written. If you're going to write a children's book that rhymes (as so many do and I am down with that), yes, you need to make sure the words rhyme, but maybe lets pay some attention to meter and foot as well. You don't need a PhD for this, just try reading your stuff out loud and if it sounds off. Because this stuff is going to be read out loud.

So let's see, what books have been a success (at least from my pov. The boy isn't yet voicing his opinions in any reliable way)

Anything Dr. Seuss. I had a lot of his stuff growing up (including a couple that were my dad's growing up) and there can be some small parts here and there that are a bit...outdated. But overall I don't find myself cringing while reading them and Seuss understands the importance of making them sound good, of finding the rhythm to the words. Current fav is Yertle the Turtle.

In My Heart: A Book of Feelings by Jo Witek, illustrated by Christine Roussey. It's an adorable book about all of the feelings (sad, happy, silly, angry) that you can have and that it's OK to have these feelings.

A Day in the Life of Marlon Bundo by Jill Twiss presented by John Oliver of Last Week Tonight. LGBT love story about bunnies at the White House and voting out the stinkbug in charge who does not want two boy bunnies to get married and this is the type of stuff we need right now.

Little Feminist collection (Activists, Artists, Pioneers and Leaders) by Emily Kleinman, illustrated by Lydia Ortiz. The board books are short (1 sentence per page, about 4 pages per book) which is about the attention span he has right now.

Runaway Bunny by Margaret Wise Brown, illustrated by Clement Hurd. A classic about a mom following around the little bunny who wants to run away (without being like that other book where the mom breaks into her adult son's house) and it is cute and also mentioned in Where'd You Go, Bernadette which is just bonus points.

There are more we've read and enjoyed but the goblin stirs so we'll have to stop here. Oh and if you have recommendations for children's books, I'm all ears!

*Did anyone else have the Wee Sing series growing up? Because they were swell.
**Legit the subject to one of the books we have and big fan when we learned THAT'S what the book was about. Sometimes life is mundane, but it is nice to pick up friends at the airport. So those are two good lessons