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Whether your child wants to be an astro-physicist, a nurse, a lawyer or an entrepreneur, independent reading is the key to achieving his/ her ambitions.  Encouraging your child to develop the habit of independent reading from an early age is like opening a window on a magic world of imagination, wonder and knowledge.  Anything can happen to anyone in a book and books can take you anywhere without having to leave your own sofa or even bed.  Children who develop the habit of independent reading at an early stage go on to outperform their non-reading counterparts – more of this in a future post.

Reading is the king of pastimes!

So how does one encourage a child to read independently?

1.  By example.  You’ve heard that the children of smokers are far more likely to smoke themselves when they grow up.  Good news: the reading habit is just as easy to inherit.  If your child sees you take the time to read quality books regularly (every day), s/he will want to do the same.  Make books part of your family and personal life.

2.  By reading to your child.  Don’t assume that once your child is reading fluently that s/he will not benefit from being read to.  You can carry on reading to your child right up until they hit their teenage years if they will let you.  The gap in reading scores between children who are read to every night before bed and children who aren’t can be as much as two years.  Some parents struggle with literacy themselves and feel anxious about reading to their child.  Try not to let that anxiety stop you: your child can benefit from seeing you persevere with a task you find difficult.

Encourage your child to read by showing them that you enjoy reading too.

3.  By providing the right texts.  Repetition of texts can be hugely beneficial to a child.  When my child was a newborn, I bought him this book a book called Rainbow Rob by Roger Priddy about a penguin who wanted to try being a different colour because black and white is boring.  In the end a zebra, a badger and a panda convince Rob that he should stick with the monochrome look.  I bought the book because I’d read that newborn babies cannot easily differentiate between colours other than black and white.  Here is a secret: more than seven years later, we still have the book and we still read it together from time to time.  We also read Roald Dahl, Julia Donaldson and he has a fine collection of non-fiction texts.  Your child’s choice of books cannot be decided on their age and whether they ‘should’ by now have moved on to Michael Morpugo.  Usborne’s ‘Very First Readers’ series is great for encouraging younger children to read independently.  Keep one in the car and put one on your child’s bed at night.  As they get a little older they might prefer to read factual books with bite-sized chunks of information about space or animals and so on.  Eventually they will progress on to fiction (with your encouragement).

You can read anywhere!

4.  By providing the right environment.  Books are fabulously portable and can be read anywhere.  However, there is a lot to  be said for providing a quiet corner in which your child can read without the distraction of television or the normal clatter of everyday household life.  Create a place for your child to read quietly and encourage him/ her to go there.  You might find your child gets a bit overexcited from time to time – ten minutes in their reading corner or nook can calm them down nicely.  Where television and computers overstimulate, reading soothes the mind.

5.  By allowing your child to choose – but only sometimes.  Reading tastes are individual and any child is more likely to read a book if they have chosen it themselves.  However, your child is not born with an innate knowledge of the world of literature so it is up to you to guide them towards the books they will really love and that will challenge them to become better readers.  If you are not sure what these are, ask in the library or local bookshop.  The staff there will be able to help.

World Book Day 2014 is tomorrow (Thursday, 6th March).  School aged children will receive a voucher which can be exchanged for a free book.  This, and the fun of dressing up as a favourite book character, is a great way to encourage independent reading.  Head off to your local independent bookshop for inspiration and the joy of choosing one’s own reading material.