Encouraging Reading is Easy!!

Do you  have a child that does not want to read, or has trouble reading?

I am not an expert, by any means on teaching reading. I have taught only two children. Tyger was easy, at the age of 4, he started to read. He wanted to learn and nearly taught himself.

On the other spectrum is Sissy. She is the one that needs encouragement, there are days where she refuses to read and will even state she does not know the letter sounds. She is almost six, and yes she can sound out letters; however, she has no use for reading, she can get Tyger to read her anything!

So, how did I encourage her? I spoke to other mothers and they said to do a reading log with a prize. I did! I am sharing it with you. This is how we are doing ours. As the child reads a book, start at the top left box and work your way down the column. At the end is a trophy with a 10 on, that symbolizes that the child has read 10 books and gets to choose a prize out of the prize box. Then you would start on the next column, at the end it has a 20 trophy, and so forth. Once the child reaches 100 they get a big prize!

For Sissy, we are asking her to read the book aloud to us, these books are very simple. We are using the Hooked On Phonic books (we don't use the program), to help her gain confidence. Tyger, has to write a one paragraph report on the  book to get his. This is mostly because he is reading the Magic Tree House Books and reads about two to three a day.

What about the prizes? We put a variety of items of fun things in the prize box. We have some organic candy, cheap bracelets, "coupons" for 20 minutes of TV, etc. For the big prize we are going to let them choose a fun activity for the family, such as going for a hike, picnic, etc. Do what fits best with your family. Each child has a different motivation factor.

You can use it how you would like, make it fun, encourage your children and read with them! Get involved in your local library and for goodness sake turn OFF the TV and video games!!!

Just go to this link to download your reading log! 100 Book Reading Log.