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Here are a children’s librarian’s tips for awakening your child’s love and curiosity for books.
PARENTHOOD – To get their child to open (and read) a book, some parents do not hesitate to use drastic measures. Like literary critic Mireille Silcoff who recently confided in a column in New York Times having offered his twelve-year-old daughter $100 to finish the first volume of The Summer I Became Prettyby teen author Jenny Han. While the method did indeed pay off (her daughter later asked her for the other two volumes to read for free), it’s far from being within everyone’s budget, and is also morally questionable.
But it’s a fact: children are reading less and less. According to the latest study by the National Book Center, one in five young people never opens a book as part of their leisure time. However, reading remains a gateway to the imagination and knowledge. So how can you make your child want to read and, above all, make them a reader for life? Some advice from Stéphanie, a youth librarian in Gironde.
A passion that is passed on from a very young age
No need to wait until your child can talk to start telling them stories. “It is even possible from the first weeks of life”assures Stéphanie. Looking at the pictures and colors, handling the cardboard pages and touching their material, listening to the soothing voice of their parent… All these moments contribute to the awakening of the newborn.
Telling stories to your child also allows, as a parent, to create real moments of tenderness and complicity. This is also why Stéphanie recommends not abandoning this practice as long as it pleases both of you. Invoking the “ancestral power of tales”she encourages parents “regardless of their child’s age, to continue reading books aloud to them”. She herself, as a librarian, continues to read to students until the start of middle school. “Because the pleasure of hearing a story, even if you know how to read it yourself, you don’t lose it.”
It’s the same principle with story boxes. Very popular with parents, they encourage children’s autonomy, who can choose for themselves what they listen to. “Like us listening to a podcast or the radio, they also like to be rocked.”
Giving a playful dimension to books
In many families, reading is an integral part of the bedtime ritual to get the child to sleep. And that’s great, says Stephanie. But associating books with quiet time alone also means ignoring the whole playful dimension of books. “I claim that the book can also be noisy, that reading can be a moment of laughter.” Many children’s books are actually designed to be real sources of distraction. “There are children’s albums where we imitate animal noises, those where we invite the child to blow…”she lists. “We must not forget that the book is a bit like cinema for children.”
Leading by example as a parent
The influence parents have on their children, even when it comes to reading, should not be underestimated. “Children imitate very early, even before they can speak. So having parents who are readers or who have this access to books at heart necessarily has positive effects.”
And when you are not a literature enthusiast yourself, nothing prevents you from accompanying your child to the media library. You ask for advice, choose one or more books together, discuss stories… Children appreciate these moments all the more because it is a place they often know well, having been there as part of their schooling. “They are very happy to show their parents a place they already know, to show them around.”
Knowing how to let go
When you are a parent and a great reader, you can be desperate to see your child abandon his or her books.Harry Potter for his video games or his smartphone. But as Stéphanie reminds us, nothing is immutable, and a child who never opens a single book may well end up devouring them once he becomes an adult. “The love of reading often comes from finding the right book or the right character.” And for this meeting to take place, we must also sometimes learn to let go. “It doesn’t matter if he never reads The Famous Five. Unlike our times, children have tenfold choice in both quantity and quality.
So if your child prefers to read The adventures of Spider-Man rather than Little Nicolaslet him do it. Same thing if he turns to not-so-intellectual comics, like Deadly Adele or Anatole Latuile. According to the professional, these comics without too much text can even ” be very effective in reconciling the child even just with the principle of the book” and to build a child’s confidence in their reading skills. “Knowing how to read is not just about deciphering letters, it is also about deciphering images.”
Waging war on manga, often considered as “fake books” by the parents, is also a shame from Stephanie’s point of view. “The discourse on manga today is the same that existed on comics forty years ago. However, there are excellent manga.” This Japanese comic strip can even be a great gateway to other types of reading, such as documentaries on Japanese culture and even… great works of literature. “Nobi Nobi editions have a very extensive and quality catalog of classics adapted into manga. Teenage girls who love romance can, for example, discover Sense and Sensibility the Jane Austen. » You have to trust your child, no matter what. “No teenager will read that Naruto or One Piece all his life. And every child can become a great reader if given the opportunity.”
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