Building a reading culture
It broke my heart to read this note that was shared in my book club. It rings so true and is such a sad state of affairs, to say the least.
Even more heart wrenching is this video. It makes me want to ask: when did the culture of reading become obsolete?
A huge part of our homeschooling journey involves building upon the reading culture we began cultivating in our home since our first child was an infant. We had him at the very start of my doctorate journey and I was such a nerd, consuming empirical research, one after the other, on the importance of establishing literacy at an early age. I read to our first child every day, began a book collection with our meager earnings (my husband and I were both students), and seized every opportunity I had to take him to the library for story time. I remember, very clearly, when the learning shifted from the "learning to read" phase to the "reading to learn" phase for my older two. That change brought so much joy and a sense of accomplishment. The change has helped ease the homeschooling process in more ways than I can account for. We have managed to build a culture of reading in our household where they kids are encouraged to learn about new ideas by reading about them and not simply depending on someone telling them about it. Our 10-year old amazes me with his interest in leisure reading, so much so that he now has his very own library day when he is dropped off at the library for about 2-hours and left to explore his interest. Here's a typical check-out stack on his weekly visit...this is after he was limited to just 15 books, five of which must be an autobiography of some sort (sample of that on the bottom).
I try not to dictate which autobiography, so I'm always excited to find out who he decides to get to know. One of the huge perks of seeing his older brothers read is my 3-year old, who is not exactly reading yet, wanting to "read" his older brothers' books. This is how the cycle begins! I sure hope our family's reading culture becomes their lifestyle.
