How did our daughter start showing interest in Books?
As parents, we have many aspirations for our kids. We aspire them to be kind, be empathetic, to know their inner self, have resilience, grow tolerant, ability to form opinions and take decisions, form habits that help them be the best self, have a growth mindset, to be curious to learn, question; to stay excited, happy; and the list probably goes on.
Manoj and I realized, there are many ways to achieve the above or influence our daughter. And one of the smartest, sustainable, and easy ways was to help her get into the habit of reading books.
Why?
At different phases, various books have helped in bringing multiple perspectives into our lives. They have been and are like a constant companion to help us guide to the desired future. Personally, I feel I have read a lot lesser books and wish I read way more from a younger age. However, I am happy I realized at least now the value of daily reading habits and am slowly working towards it. Last year after many many years, I could read 12+ books while Manoj read around 22 books.
So books we felt have some answers to the aspirations we have as parents for our kids.
With Leela, our daughter, we did try a few things to make her like books, enjoy them, but didn’t have much success. However, one evening we visited a Public Library in Berlin, during our 3-month visit there. And her relationship with books changed since then. It has been a lot easier to introduce books and make them part of our daily conversations.
In hindsight and after reading many books, blogs, and other parents’ experiences, I have realized the mistakes I have made. So if I had a chance to re-do, I would keep the following in mind.
1. Children need to see Parents reading books
I had asked one of my friends, Suresh, whom I admire for his choice of words and his command of language. He had a piece of wonderful advice.
“ As for getting your child to love languages — the keys are with you. Unless she sees you reading, you’ll never be able to sell the idea to her that reading could be fun. She’s got to see her parents read plus she needs to be read to, considering she’s only three and a half years old.”
Before we ask them to read books, we need to get into the habit of reading. They need to see us, going for a book, with the slightest time available instead of the phone or a TV.
We Parents,
Overestimate the influence of our instructions, words have on our kids.
Underestimate the power our actions, leading by example have on our kids.
It is a win-win situation. Kids get influenced without us shouting or losing our tempers. And we also are improving ourselves or being a better version of ourselves by reading a book.
I realized I wasn’t practicing reading books myself. And to make it worse I was opting to check a WhatsApp message or emails, with the tiniest free time available. And after setting goals, failing at them, and again trying today, I am in a little better position than my past self but there is a lot to improve. As my screen time still goes to a couple of hours in a day.
2. Start as early as possible
Start the habit of reading books to kids at a very young age. One could read to even a just-born baby. We all hear about the influence of talking and telling stories to the baby in the womb, but somehow we get busy with other things when they are born, out of the womb. So there is no right age to wait for, to introduce books.
Recently, one of my grandfathers shared this interesting article with me. And the below excerpt reminded me that at times we used to buy and read even books that were not exactly meant for Leela’s age.
And if possible, please delay introducing Screens and TV to as much time as possible. It sounds impossible. But it is, I have met mothers and parents, who have not introduced any form of the screen to their kids till the age of 2, 4 years. I understand it is extremely challenging, and I too did that mistake. I introduced TV before even putting enough effort into reading to her.
There are many reasons why screens are not good for kids, but one of the things that really stuck with me was what my friend, Anuradha (co-founder of this beautiful new playschool) once had shared. The world of Screens is so bright, so colorful, so attractive, and immersive that the real world around starts to seem too pale and boring to them. So the books have to compete with these high definition animations, that have music, that move, etc.
So it will be much harder to introduce books if we introduce TV before.
3. Regularly buy or borrow books.
Invest regularly in buying bright, picture-rich, vocabulary-rich, diverse, quality books. I agree, Children's books are expensive. A few ideas to reduce that burden.
- One can find many good books in second-hand sale exhibitions or pre-loved books website.
- Take membership in a good children’s library.
- Among friends or a society, we can share and circulate books.
- Skip one time’s plan of eating outside to create a budget for a book.
Instead of going for another fluffy soft toy or another car, reconsider your thought and choose a book. Consider gifting books to your friends' kids or loved ones.
Among the choice of books, I highly recommend including books in one’s mother tongue.
“ Mother tongue is vital in framing the thinking and emotions of people. Learning to speak in the mother tongue is very necessary for a child’s comprehensive development. Being fluent in the mother tongue, which is also known as the native language, benefits the child in numerous ways.” — Link for the full article
Involve grandparents in telling these stories to our kids if possible. My mother tongue being Telugu, I can recommend the below sources. Two of them have options for other Indian languages too.
- https://manchipustakam.in/ (Only Telugu and English Books)
- https://www.tulikabooks.com/bilingual-books/ (Multiple Indian Languages and English Books)
- https://store.prathambooks.org/productCategory(Multiple Indian Languages and English Books including STEM books)
4. Create a reading routine in your daily schedule.
I can’t emphasize enough how much actually Children love structure, order, routines, and consistency. There is a lot of research telling us about it. However, this has also been one of my biggest regrets as a mother that I have not been able to deliver a consistent routine for a long time to Leela. And it has taken almost a year to get into some kind of a predictable structure with Leela. Even now there is a lot to work on.
I realized though I intended, I didn’t introduce books early on with Leela. Somehow, I was busy with work and the little time I had, used to be busy with feeding her, giving her a bath, etc. I didn’t seriously allocate time in a day exclusively to read out to her.
And once you have some structure and routine, it’s easier to include a storytime into that. We have started reading books at bedtime. Leela chooses 4 books from her library to be read to before sleeping. What is fascinating to see, is that Children get used to these habits easily and want them to happen every day. Every day without fail she demands we read out stories to her, it’s we adults who are tired, plead her to excuse us sometimes from that routine.
Choose a time and schedule that’s suitable for you. Try different timings to arrive at a time. Keep in mind your and your Child’s energy levels too for this activity. Reading habits and structure will help in other aspects of Child growth too.
Children, as they grow older, would like to read by themselves, even if it is to just flip the pages to see pictures. So creating a cozy reading nook in your home, sometimes helps in reinforcing this thought of reading books.
5. Consider other forms of introducing Language and Stories
Take kids' to storytelling workshops, to Public Libraries within your city, or when you are visiting different cities, other forms of books like Children Newspaper or Children Magazines, Puppet shows, Children plays, movies, etc.
We never know, what can trigger the interest in a particular kids’ mind. So always be willing to experiment with different forms and options. With Leela, it was a visit to a big, bright, colorful Public Library that triggered her interest in Books and stories and eventually to reading.
I hope there were some useful takeaways and are helpful in your journey.
I would love to hear your challenges, your ideas, your perspectives, and your feedback, so please don’t forget to comment.
PS: The above blog is part of series of blogs I intend to write to spread awareness among my friends and others about the importance of books and libraries in a Child’s life. I am trying to raise funds to donate Children's Books to at least 10 (earlier it was 4, due to good response we have increased the goal) Gram Panchayat Libraries. It will be great if you can contribute to this initiative. Thank You.
Link to donate: https://donateabook.org.in/campaign/raising-funds-for-libraries-in-gram-panchayats-of-udupi-district-of-karnataka/
Link to know more about this initiative: https://www.facebook.com/nandini.rabelli/posts/10159129247131221
