If you know me, then chances are you know that I love to read. It doesn't even really take you knowing me well to know that fact. It isn't something that I even try to hide.
I recently started working here in Finland. I am working as an au pair for a family with three children. The oldest two are girls(ages twelve and eight) and the youngest is a boy(aged four). One of the first things they discovered about me was that I love to read. When I moved in with the family I had with me a bag of library books which I then proceeded to finish reading over the next week at a rate of about one book every two days.
Now the parents love the fact that I read. I am setting a good example for their children with the reading and the fact that I clearly enjoy it. The girls however are not so enthusiastic about it, and I think they don't really understand how someone can love reading so much because they are always asking me why I like reading.
The eight year old doesn't mind reading too much though, and she has even read some of english books to me and she is pretty good at reading them. The oldest however really dislikes reading. To me this is a challenge, and it is a challenge I intend to take on and hopefully she will eventually want to read the books she has to read or at least she will read ones she wants when she wants and read the ones for school without too much complaining.
So far I have started with getting her to read one chapter of a book at a time. I sit there reading my own book next to her and she gets a chance to play with my Nintendo DS when she has read at least a chapter, and this has been working. But I don't think this solves the issue with why she doesn't want to read. So today I went to the library with her and got her to borrow two books- one in Finnish and one in English. I will read at least a chapter of the English book to her each day and hopefully she will enjoy it. And I think we hit on a winner. She got home today and read a chapter of the Finnish book (Hannah Montanta) without complaining. Her mum was extremely happy. Then when she went to bed I read her a chapter of the English book (Sabrina the Teenage Witch). The best thing about ti is she enjoyed it! She wanted me to keep reading but she was almost asleep already so I will read more on another night.
But I am so happy. Already I am making a change in her reading habits. She complains less and hopefully with some better chosen books, then she will choose to read without being told to read her book. Fingers crossed that this reading continues. I know I will continue to read as much as I can and maybe one day she will enjoy reading even half as much as I do.
In the meantime I need to think up more variety of rewards for reading than just playing with my Nintendo DS. Maybe some kind of reading sticker chart or something with a bigger reward once she gets so many stickers.
Anyone got any other thoughts on ideas to encourage reading or ways to encourage reading?
Also I have been slack in updating since I got to Finland(something pointed out by a friend), but I haven't been online so much and have been pretty busy. I do have a half written post about Estonia that I need to finish and put up and will try to make more regular posts now I am getting a bit more settled. Maybe I will do another one this weekend.
~~ Random Logic ~~
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