Middle School question: How best to encourage a 6th grader to read more?

Parents Forum
1

<p>Most of the parents here, I’m sure are great readers, and I hope and assume your children are too. DD1 was adequate at reading works outside classroom assignments (she is a college sophomore majoring in Engineering); DD2 is exceptional, has read every 19th century novel, much of the 20th century, reads in French, and is in the 99th percentile of any test measurement. But this is just a prelude to my perhaps very faulty concern about DD3: SHE DOES NOT READ. The 6th grade teacher makes the children always have a reading book, and she does read during reading time in the classroom, academic lab (study hall) and before bed. But the titles are all these new Olympic Gods science fiction titles. She is missing all the great books written for young readers; it breaks my heart. Our pediatrician told her/me to limit her iPad usage to an hour a day. OMG, I can hardly pry it away from her, and even the most forceful limits on iPad time end in a difficult way. Age 11, if we show her that iPad time is up, she has several times thrown a tantrum like a two year old (although ironically none of my daughters actually threw tantrums), and upset herself even to the point of vomiting. It has happened several times. After she has shocked herself by having this happen, she quietly goes to bed. But, to be more direct and to the point, I regret to say that she is on and off the iPad from 3 pm to 8:30 pm, with intervals for eating meals, doing homework, but that’s about it. We do insist that she read from 8:30 to 10:30 ever night, and she does. In general, she is a very good, compliant, pleasant girl with many friends…and to my astonishment, her report card just arrived and her average is 96.33 and her grade in English is 99. Today and tomorrow are parent/teacher conferences so I made an appt to meet with the English teacher this afternoon. Perhaps in a great stumble, I showed the English teacher DD3’s report card, and said , Is this a typo (the 99’5 in English)? She said absolutely not! She showed me her spread sheet where activities/accomplishments in the class were individually evaluated: they were things like binder organization; vocabulary quizzes; pronoun quizzes; reading comprehension. That was all fine. But there isn’t anything going on about the deep valuable brain-activity enhancing activity of reading for broad knowledge and understanding. Personally I think, simply by reading broadly and much, you can build your mental and emotional health, and much more. The teacher made a great suggestion: Encourage your daughter to read what she LIKES. DD3 LIKES science fiction/this new stuff. I cannot MAKE her like Black Beauty and Charlotte’s Web, the books I liked.</p>

<p>So I went to the library and met with the children’s librarian whom I have known for 20 years (our DDs1 were in playgroup together). We have arranged for DD3, librarian and me, to meet on Tues for librarian to give DD3–she is very gifted at this–a compelling “go for it” talk about reading-how differently reading builds the brain than an iPad sky ping and chatting with friends–and she is going to preselect titles for DD3 to take home, the kind of books she likes. And we plotted an afternoon time line of IPad time / reading time/ dinner/ more iPad time (she will get plenty of iPad time).</p>

<p>After all this chat, please don’t think I am pushing DD3. Remember, as of today, she has the iPad from 3 pm to 8:30 pm which is just horrific to me. My husband is understandably job-focused and cannot help me with this. I hope the meeting with the librarian will.</p>

<p>But the question I find so curious–and I would love feedback on all of this–given the fact that DD3 spends SO much time sky ping and chatting in bubble talk with her friends, and so little time reading, her average astonished me: 96.33, and 99 in English. How can a child who does practically no homework or studying or reading be at the top of her class? We are rural, but still competitive school district. We are 9- miles north of NYC. Not crazy like NYC or Scarsdale, but still the teachers set and expect very high expectations. </p>

<p>And finally, the craziest question, does it even matter if you spend 5 hours on the iPad every single day; would a psychologist say her brain is making strides in its own way…and simply leave her alone?</p>

<p>She is a very obedient girl, friends with her older sisters whom she respects and emulates (the ONLY way I am able to get her to go to Chinese school on Saturdays–because her sisters go), but very deeply, deeply attached to this IPad. I mean like, if we go to a simple grocery store, she will not leave it in the car; she will take it in to listen to music on the iPad. Her biggest gift, i think is she will let no one get in her way; this girl, when she grows up, will NOT be blocked by any obstacles.</p>

<p>Looking forward to your analysis and comments. Thanks for listening.</p>

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<p>One simple thought: even if you are a voracious reader of many genres, it is difficult (sometimes near impossible) to want to read books you simply aren’t interested in. </p>

<p>Would she be more willing to read different types of books if they were on the iPad? </p>

3

<p>I had kids before ipads and the other portable electronics so I can’t give you advice there.</p>

<p>But I will tell you in general- you are the parent and have a right to limit the use of anything you find problematic. In the old days it was talking on the phone. Appropriate to set limits. Then it was dragging a laptop everywhere or playing video games.</p>

<p>You do not need to apologize when you sit down with your daughter and explain that ipad use is for the hours of x-y, and after that, she needs to surrender it to you until the next day. period full stop. It’s your house and you make the rules and set the tone. Anytime she wishes to have her Ipad time expanded, she can request a meeting with you, or put it in writing, and you’d be happy to listen to her arguments. But right now, 3-4 pm or 4-5 pm is Ipad time and the rest of her afternoon and evening will be spent doing other things- household chores? Does she have regular responsibilities? My kids had to do laundry by middle school (at least sorting before the wash, folding and putting away after the wash) which for sure would have cut into their skyping time!</p>

<p>If she’s not naturally inclined to read you can’t force her. But a bored kid is a kid who will likely pick up a book. And 11 is not too young to make a salad, cut up fruit, etc. when she gets home from school so you don’t have the entire responsibility for meal prep when you get home from work.</p>

4

<p>Near the beginning of your post, you say your dd doesn’t read, but then later on you say that she reads from 8:30-10:30. Which is it? </p>

5

<p>Taking away her iPad- just do it despite any misbehavior. Treat like a child when she behaves like a child. Good idea to limit her iPad time. Why do you let her take it with her if you don’t want her to use it???</p>

<p>Regarding reading. ANY book qualifies. Don’t worry about her choices, they don’t need to be great literature- she’ll get plenty of that as assigned reading. I, a woman, am very fond of fantasy and science fiction. There are some excellent authors out there (I even took a college elective literature course in college called Fantasy and Science Fiction- it was a great excuse to read fun books). I was a National Merit Scholar, then a Chemistry major and physician. As a fast reader she may read more books than those who are slower. I can list tons of well written books/authors she may like. It is often difficult to find age and intellect appropriate books at this stage. Escape literature serves a great purpose. Fantasy and sci fi explore the same themes as other fiction but by using different worlds can often better deal with exploring how/why societies and physical things exist. It requires thinking to handle nonstandard worlds.</p>

<p>btw- how much time do YOU spend reading? Set a good example, not having the time is no excuse. She’s already reading 2 hours per evening (8:30-10:30) according to you- that’s already plenty. </p>

<p>You ARE being controlling as well. Mandatory Chinese school work every Saturday. Mandatory reading time. Talking with people about her reading.</p>

<p>Be thankful she has friends to spend time with. I would worry more if she did not have social contacts.</p>

<p>She is generally obedient you say. She likely has found this as her rebellion, growing need for autonomy. You are still trying to fit her into the mold you have chosen for her. Be careful about being too restrictive or she will find worse ways to act out. The more you push her the more she’ll push back (hence the iPad struggles). They say “pick your battles” and rewards are better than punishment. What incentive does she have to do more reading? None that I can see.</p>

<p>Please do not become the stereotypic Chinese mom- allow more flexible thinking. This is not the end of the world. </p>

<p>I could go on and on more but will quit here.</p>

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<p>Read with her. Create a mother/daughter book club and read the same book together. Take turns picking the book. so one month, it can be one of the classics you loved and the next it can be the science fiction novel of her choice. I’ve done this with two kids – it’s a great way to build a bond over books. And you may be surprised that the books she chooses are not quite as awful as you thought :wink: </p>

7

<p>Have DEAR time at home. DEAR = Drop everything and read. Everyone in your house… you, your husband, any siblings. You can read together in one room or not, no TV, maybe some nice music if not distracting. When my kids were younger, pre-Ipad and electronic devices, there was DEAR time in school in which everyone from the custodian to the principal dropped everything they were doing and read. Did they do it every day? No… some schools do have reading or journal writing your choice every day for an hour or so. Our district also had special read-in days, usually pre-holiday in which you brought a selection of books and comfy pillows and sat on the floor with snacks and read for your pleasure.
With my kids both very strong readers, we continued reading aloud to each other mostly every day until they were really busy with activities and AP classes and so on in high school but we still always tried to do so whenever we were away on vacation. Even though neither live with me and are now post-college, we sometimes still enjoy times reading outloud to each other and when younger d and her boyfriend are here, they read aloud to each other all the time. </p>

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<p>You and the school are doing everything to make the daughter think of reading as a compulsory activity, not recreation. Just let her read what she wants.</p>

<p>I used to be a neo-Luddite myself but have learned, with one non-reader myself, that Facebook and other online activities have made her into a wonderful writer, and it is also a great way for her social generosity to come out.</p>

<p>Your daughter is getting close to an age when she will learn to self-regulate.</p>

<p>If you want to limit time on the IPad, fine, though that kind of punishment may be tough on a kid who is clearly meeting her obligations. Clearly her reading skills are fine.</p>

<p>Beyond that, I would not legislate a reading list: it will take away any love of reading she has, which is focused on the science fiction despite your wishes that she read 19th century classics.</p>

9

<p>She’s already reading for two hours a day - what more could you ask for? That is PLENTY for someone her age, and much much more than many of her peers. As for content, it really doesn’t matter if what she’s reading is a “great book”, as long as she enjoys it. I was also a science fiction reader (and still am) at that age and HATED classic books, and it certainly hasn’t held me back in life</p>

10

<p>The way to foster a love of reading is… to read. Your daughter needs to be allowed to read hatever she is attracted to. She will not always want to read Percy Jackson, but why do you care if that is the genre she likes right now? My own daughter re-read the series over and over. The books were a starting point to learn more about Greek Mythology. </p>

<p>Let her read. </p>

11

<p>Good lord, you are the parent. The I pad doesn’t come out till homework/reading is finished. You are her mom, not her friend…get a backbone.</p>

12

<p>Trying to wrap my brain around this…
Because your kid doesn’t read what you like you think she’s not reading?
Get over the “great titles”, “stuff your great great great great parents read”.</p>

<p>Reading is good, reading well is best. And it sounds like she reads very well.</p>

<p>Reading all the “great literature” will come eventually. It may take a few more years to appreciate it.<br>
But all literature started off as “new, off the presses” stuff. Maybe you need to read what she is reading (good idea no matter how great a reader your kid is or isn’t).</p>

<p>All books will eventually be ipad/tablet–I’m not sure how that will impact the enjoyment of books. Many people love “real” books for so many reasons. My D bought a hard copy of a classic–she read it on ipad. </p>

13

<p>Steer her towards Heinlein, Tolkien, Orson Scott Card, Whatever she likes.</p>

<p>You don’t say what she uses the iPad for—reading, games, research? What does it matter?<br>
Well, it can matter depending on use.
I spent hours on hours with my nose in a book (tons of them)–today it would be an iPad.</p>

14

<p>Why do you think science fiction isn’t as literary as Charlotte’s Web? There is plenty of excellent, thoughtful, vocabulary building sci fi out there. I don’t read stuff I don’t like, and neither do you. Reading for pleasure and enrichment should be, well, pleasurable and enriching.</p>

15

<p>Is there something important for which she actually needs the ipad? Or is it just recreation? We don’t have any ipads so I don’t know what they are for. Why can’t you just take it away completely for a couple of years? Give it back when she is older. We did that for one of our kids when we made the mistake of getting cellphones when she was not ready. There was some initial storm but it died down fast. Reading and jigsaw puzzles and other activities quickly filled the open time.</p>

<p>Seems like sport of some kind would be good idea. Swimming, track, ping-pong. Way too much time in sedentary activities for a 12-year-old. Does her school have organized sports for kids her age? I would be a lot more worried about that than the lack of reading.</p>

<p>And I’m with others who say let her read sci fi and fantasy. There is great stuff in those genres. She’ll get enough classical lit in her AP English and etc. classes.</p>

<p>When my kids were that age I had them come in the kitchen and read to me to entertain me while I made dinner. We still read aloud at bedtime too, took turns. Not the same books as when they were 6 of course. H and I read Dickens and Dawkins to each other so it doesn’t seem artificial in our family. But yeah, the electronics do interfere with the kind of deep experience that you refer to. In adults as well as children. It’s very pervasive. </p>

<p>In our community there is a children’s theater group that performs full length uncut Shakespeare/Shaw/Dickens works. My D got involved with that in 6th grade and learned all those authors by heart. It was time consuming, but she loved it. It was social and somewhat non-sedentary. Is there anything like that where you live?</p>

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<p>I read almost nothing but Andre Norton when I was your kid’s age, and I turned out fine. I say, let the kid read whatever it is she likes. Better yet, YOU sit down and claw your way through one or two of those novels so you can talk with her about them. If they are well written mechanically, so that she has good models for grammar, stop worrying. There is plenty of time for her to start reading more broadly in the future.</p>

17

<p>I am sympathetic OP. My kids don’t read as much as I would like. Those little kids I read so many books to for so many years, the ones I was sure would grow up to love books…would rather do other things. Like your D, they are good readers. They just don’t read books. </p>

<p>I agree with the above posters that you should just let her follow her interests. Let her read sci fi if that is what she likes. </p>

<p>What is she doing on that iPad btw? Some stuff she could be doing would be good for literacy----someone above mentioned Facebooking as a route to writing better. Is she writing messages to friends? Is she surfing the net reading random stuff she finds? Is she on special interest forums (like this one)? Or is she playing games? </p>

<p>Fwiw I thought the whole screens/video game obsession got better when they hit high school. All that Call of Duty and Starcraft was replaced with sports and after school activities without me having to nag. </p>

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<p>My kids got 790 and 800 on the SATs a steady diet of sci fi and fantasy. It sounds like she’s reading just not what YOU want. The best way to get a kid to read is let them read books of their choice. </p>

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<p>So many things in your post not making sense to me. </p>

<p>First, your daughter reads 2 hours a day, but that’s not enough for you? It’s “practically no” reading? Two hours of leisure reading is quite a bit, and I say this as a parent of two voracious readers. She’s in school much of the day, you make her spend her Saturdays in Chinese school, she’s getting great grades, she evidently has a good social life as well. How many hours do you expect her to read daily if two is not enough? And she must read what, 3 or 4 hours per day, over and above doing her schoolwork, and read books that don’t interest her? This does sound like tiger Asian parenting to me.</p>

<p>My kids love the fantasy stuff, they love to read, and generally won’t read the “classics” you are trying to ram down your daughter’s throat. Do I wish they would read them? Yes. But what is the gain if they have to be dragged through it kicking and screaming? When my kids were in elementary school, they were assigned to read 30 minutes per school night (that’s way less than you are demanding, by the way). I told them they needed to read something that was not trashy if it was fulfilling an assignment for school. Reading they chose to do over and above the school work was their selection. In this way they got through some of the classics. But when they got into middle school they became more willful and there weren’t explicit reading assignments any more. So that kind of fell apart. Percy Jackson was a big hit and it does encourage interest in mythologies they will need to know. It could be worse-- be thankful she evidently hasn’t discovered the teen vampire romances yet. I would guess my kids read about 30-50 books per year of their own accord but none of them were Black Beauty. </p>

<p>With regard to the ipad, what does a 6th grader need an ipad for anyhow? You made the mistake of giving her an expensive and addictive electronic toy that she can take anywhere and now she’s hooked. What did you expect would happen? All the middle schoolers I’ve known with smart phones can’t tear themselves away from them, not even to interact normally with their peers or participate in group activities they are supposed to be a part of. (I don’t think I knew any who had an ipad). If she’s having tantrums at her age clearly it’s a problem. Just take it away and encourage her to do other things. I see this as a much bigger problem than the fact that she won’t dutifully spend most of her leisure time reading books that interest you.</p>

<p>Just wanted to add, my older daughter did broaden her reading selections quite a bit of her own accord in high school, and was a National Merit scholar. My 14 year old tore herself away from reading fantasy recently so she could write her first novel; teachers rave about her writing. Both have exceptional reading test scores. So while I would have preferred they read more classic literature, I don’t think that reading a ton of fantasy did them any harm.</p>

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<p>Yes, a lot of the plentiful comments above–thank you–make sense to me, helped me straighten my thinking out on the broader picture. As several of you pointed out, DD3 does read two hrs at bedtime 8:30-10:30 ( I DON’T like it that it’s so late). So I completely blew it right there. About getting the iPad, we didn’t give it to her. It was a birthday present to my husband from a sister-in law with money and DD3 snuck away with it. What drives me mad is that she is with the iPad all afternoon, and most of it is Skype and bubble talking with friends. I would like to see her reading in the afternoons for PLEASURE AND ENRICHMENT, not this dumb stuff on the iPad. It’s certainly not that I want to be “controlling”–that idea horrifies me . What I would like to do is exactly this: have her see how books can take her many places, stimulate her curiosity, deepen her understanding. </p>

<p>But all of the above makes good sense and I read it all several times over, promise.</p>

<p>BTW, DH and I are not Chinese; our three daughters are adopted.</p>