Email Response One:
Hi Helen,
Thank you for your email about dads reading to their children, I think as a dad with two grown up children it's only now I am beginning to fully realise the importance of reading to children. I think reading has a number of benefits other than just improving a child's reading, it develops;
1. A time where dad and son/daughter can spend time together. Having times together allows a strong relationship to develop that can help bring stability into a child's life.
2. Talking about the story being read with dad can help bring other issues that the child is worried or concerned out into the open. Dad can help the child through issues because they have developed a strong relationship together.
3. Helping a child to read can not only help them improve their education standards it can improve their children's educational standards, so it has a long term benefit.
I think dads can often get caught up with other things and loose sight of the importance of reading to children. Work, tv, sports, going down the pub Xbox all compete for dads time. I think reminders could happen in a number of ways a short tv advert, poster in key places, sports venues and pubs. key people in the public eye talking about their reading to their children. A slot on children in need about the importance of reading and perhaps money being spent to provide the most needy families with books. I think the governments financial cuts which have resulted in many libraries closing has made it even more difficult for low income families to access free books. For some families where money is tight buying books is a luxury they can't afford when they are struggling to pay bills.
I think big public organisations such as Devon County Council and the NHS, have messages spaces on their pay slips a few sentences about spending 10 minutes a day reading to your child everyday would get seen by every one reading their pay slip.
Dads could make reading stories fun buy reading characters in funny voices, getting items of clothing and putting them on when reading the book, this would make the reading a fun time.
Ideas for helping dads read to children would be to take a well known book such as Harry Potter,have the dad dressed in wizards out fit with a child in one hand and the book under the arm and with the other arm using the wand to fight of the things that stop dads and children spending time together to read. So their could be a a caricature of a TV creeping up, a boss demanding more house to be worked, a football with legs and arms trying to drag the dad away from the child.
Mark
Email Response Two:
Dan loves reading to the girls, the key for him was reading them books he enjoyed reading as a child (Danny Champion of the World etc) For men any books with noises is good, I've found many seem to be self conscious about reading 'children's story books'. Maybe 'Dad Stories' could be a compilation of stories that men would be more comfortable reading...not all fluffy bunnies and rhyming!!! Could have 'For dad's ONLY' warning on the front?! We found at school, dad's preferred non-fiction books where they could make something I.e. Scarecrow / junk model car, or on things like toys they used to play with. Also, joke books, pop-up / interactive books, illustration books, where's wally, Minecraft etc. Many boys struggle with reading compared to girls, maybe positive male role model would build boys self confidence with reading. Reading is important interaction, builds knowledge of sentence structure, intonation of speech, rhyming patterns, story lines, imagination, descriptions etc etc!!! Reading time interesting by choosing books either I enjoyed or ones they would like to read but which would be 'hard work' for them to read. At school all classes now have to have a class book the teacher reads, just because they can read doesn't mean we have to stop reading to them. Hope that makes sense! Good luck. If you want anymore feedback my friend is literacy consultant & brill at reading / book linked ideas for reading in & out of school. Emma xx
Email Response Three:
Could you put design on variety of products ? Not just books but magazines, instructions (for eg in construction products / games manuals eg for Minecraft), fact sheets, information websites, games, sports brochures, newspapers. Products that Dads typically like doing with their kids.
Dads should read about something they’re interested in – then they’ll be more passionate and their reading will be more interesting. Equally find something the kids like so they see the purpose of learning to read so they can understand the text/ so they enjoy the text. Ideally find something that inspires both kids and Dads.
Reading isn’t just about books but a wide variety of products which demonstrate different uses and types of language. Kids sometimes get bogged down with a whole book so it’s refreshing to do something shorter with them (eg get them to read segments from a magazine, kids’ picture dictionary, puzzle book, comic book, poems etc). You could let child choose one article to read and they choose one for you. Get young kids to read names of items in supermarket/ on shopping list. The 10 minute reading doesn’t have to be sitting down with a book (although this is nice of course!) Get older kids to try to follow a set of instructions (eg to build a model / play a computer game)
Reading books – You can try lots of different ways of reading a book to make things more interesting. Dad reads one page, child reads another... Dad reads the text and child reads the dialogue (really helps improve fluency). Perhaps have two books on the go – one of child’s choice which Dad reads to them and one of child’s choice which child reads to Dad. Allow child some silent reading time (for more fluent readers) but Dad asks questions on text to make sure child has understood.
Dan loves reading to the girls, the key for him was reading them books he enjoyed reading as a child (Danny Champion of the World etc) For men any books with noises is good, I've found many seem to be self conscious about reading 'children's story books'. Maybe 'Dad Stories' could be a compilation of stories that men would be more comfortable reading...not all fluffy bunnies and rhyming!!! Could have 'For dad's ONLY' warning on the front?! We found at school, dad's preferred non-fiction books where they could make something I.e. Scarecrow / junk model car, or on things like toys they used to play with. Also, joke books, pop-up / interactive books, illustration books, where's wally, Minecraft etc. Many boys struggle with reading compared to girls, maybe positive male role model would build boys self confidence with reading. Reading is important interaction, builds knowledge of sentence structure, intonation of speech, rhyming patterns, story lines, imagination, descriptions etc etc!!! Reading time interesting by choosing books either I enjoyed or ones they would like to read but which would be 'hard work' for them to read. At school all classes now have to have a class book the teacher reads, just because they can read doesn't mean we have to stop reading to them. Hope that makes sense! Good luck. If you want anymore feedback my friend is literacy consultant & brill at reading / book linked ideas for reading in & out of school. Emma xx
Email Response Three:
Could you put design on variety of products ? Not just books but magazines, instructions (for eg in construction products / games manuals eg for Minecraft), fact sheets, information websites, games, sports brochures, newspapers. Products that Dads typically like doing with their kids.
Dads should read about something they’re interested in – then they’ll be more passionate and their reading will be more interesting. Equally find something the kids like so they see the purpose of learning to read so they can understand the text/ so they enjoy the text. Ideally find something that inspires both kids and Dads.
Reading isn’t just about books but a wide variety of products which demonstrate different uses and types of language. Kids sometimes get bogged down with a whole book so it’s refreshing to do something shorter with them (eg get them to read segments from a magazine, kids’ picture dictionary, puzzle book, comic book, poems etc). You could let child choose one article to read and they choose one for you. Get young kids to read names of items in supermarket/ on shopping list. The 10 minute reading doesn’t have to be sitting down with a book (although this is nice of course!) Get older kids to try to follow a set of instructions (eg to build a model / play a computer game)
Reading books – You can try lots of different ways of reading a book to make things more interesting. Dad reads one page, child reads another... Dad reads the text and child reads the dialogue (really helps improve fluency). Perhaps have two books on the go – one of child’s choice which Dad reads to them and one of child’s choice which child reads to Dad. Allow child some silent reading time (for more fluent readers) but Dad asks questions on text to make sure child has understood.
There are lots of interesting kids’ books now for starter readers – Usbourne ladybird style books come in lots of different levels and cover huge variety of topics. They give kids real sense of achievement as they feel they are reading a proper book. Also cartoon style books like Tom Gates, Dennis the Menace, Super cat are becoming ever more popular.
Horrid Henry / Dirty Bertie books – v funny. Would be a big hit with Dads I think.
Equally Dads can read lots of different things to your children – articles from newspapers, interesting info you’ve seen on website, books. Reading something that would be harder than the child’s own reading level allows them to explore topics they can’t yet read about. It promotes discussion. Reading to your child allows the child to see how much fun reading can be. You are role model for your child.
Hope you can wade your way through fairly random brainstorming. Let me know if you need any more !
Bernie x
Email Response Four:
Hi Helen,
Not sure how much I can help you on this as I've always loved reading to my kids.
When the kids are younger I think the key is to have books that are fun to read - I really miss reading Julia Donaldson books to my kids her combination of words and pictures were just great. Reading as part of the going to bed routine was key, but if the father is not part of that going to bed routine (which I guess he often wouldn't be in your target group) then that is probably the thing you have to focus on. By the way, the statistician in me says be careful about the numbers being quoted in that report, I would guess they have found a correlation but not necessarily a causality.
As they get older reading longer books a chapter each night is great fun and there are loads of great books for that.
One thing we did as the kids were getting older was to watch the film of the book after we had read it together (e.g. Harry Potter and Narnia series).
I think its important for dad's to read to their boys in particular, so they do not associate reading as a girlie thing. There was a TV series on this a year or two ago - can't remember it's name but the guy who did it was the guy who does that choir in the workplace thing. Basically his premise was is school particularly reception etc is geared towards girls not boys and that is why girls now do so much better than boys. He made the dad's come in and read round a campfire to the boys.
Other things that may work with some fathers (not me !) is things like lego kits where you have to read instructions to put the kit together.
Hope this helps
Andy
Email Response Five:
I say to Charlie, "are you washing up or reading with the kids?" and he reads with the kids! I think the earlier you enjoy books with you child the better, regardless if mum or dad takes the lead. If dad reads then mum is tidying up, if mum reads then dad is tidying up, the main thing is that one of you is reading with your child. To be honest I don't like the whole generalisation of 'dads like this type of book' , should be about what the child likes. Take them to a library and let them explore. Libraries are great, they have storytellers, fun events and they are free. It is quite an exciting concept for a child that they can choose 10 books and take them home! Louis has had periods of not wanting to read and I just order some Asterix, Tin Tin or Simpsons to keep him ticking along. I'm a great believer of making reading enjoyable and not a chore, and you shouldn't push your child to read high level books. Books shouldn't just be for bedtime, and they shouldn't be a timed chore. Should just be part of your day. If Also children need to see parents reading and enjoying books. Probably lots of children just see their parents fiddling on their phones. I think that would be a good idea to do something like 'put down your phone and pick up a book' sort of thing, especially if you want to aim at dads. Good luck and keep us posted xx
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