I guess it started when I was teaching English for college kids who weren’t quite ready for the college level courses. The one thing I noticed across the board was that they hated reading. Detested it. And it wasn’t just required English class reading that they despised. They didn’t even like magazines or articles from the web. Every now and again I would have an exception, but they were few and far between.

At the time I didn’t have any children, but I told myself that when I did, I would work very hard to make sure that they love reading.

And that work takes on different forms at different times. But following are some ways that I try to promote an environment of literacy in our home:

– Books. As I said, we have a ton. And as much as I complain about our out of control book supply, I’m the one who keeps on buying more. Bookstores, garage sales, second hand stores, library sales. If they sell books, I probably will be purchasing them. And we keep them everywhere. We have bookshelves or baskets in every bedroom in our house, our living room, our car, and multiple bathrooms. Part of this is because when you have that many books, they tend to accumulate everywhere, but it’s also more purposeful than that. I want books to be everywhere so that when one of the girls is looking for something to do, a book is always close by.

– Starting young. I started reading to all three girls before they were born. Obviously this really has no cognitive benefit to it, but I think it helps to establish the habit. And it’s one of very few things you can do with an unborn babe! But then once they are born, I start reading to them in the hospital. My favorite hospital read is On the Night You Were Born.

– Variety. I do my best to have many different types of books in our house — nursery rhymes, poetry, non-fiction, old stories, new stories, and so on. When we go to the book store, I often pick out a book or two, and then I let them pick one out. They will almost always choose a Disney princess book or Barbie. I go with it. They aren’t my favorites, and I definitely want them to have a more well-rounded view of themselves and the world, and I want them to have higher standards in regards to the literature they love, but everyone needs guilty pleasure reading every now and again, and for them, it’s princesses.

– Being available. It is very rare that I will say no to the girls when they want me to read a book. There are times, for sure, but if I’m not busy doing something urgent for one of the other ones, I’ll pretty much always sit down for at least a story or two. They like cuddling for reading. Goose insists on sitting with a blanket on her lap while Magoo just likes cuddling. Mae likes it when we lay on my bed and I hold the book over our heads. It’s our time. A time when I can shut off the world and just pay attention to my girls and a good story.

I could go on and on. The area of literacy development is a passion of mine, and so I have read a lot about it. But we’ll save that for another day. I wanted to end with just a couple of our favorite books.

Animals Animals by Eric Carle. Mae and I are having a lot of fun with this book. It’s a book of poetry by many different authors from different time periods, and they are all accompanied by Eric Carle’s illustrations. Mae loves the big, bright pictures. She’ll lay there just staring at them, letting me read to her for quite some time. Each page is something new. And I like it because the poetry is gorgeous.

Tickle Time by Sandra Boyton. Goosie got this book for her birthday, and it is currently her favorite. In standard Boyton fashion, the book is in rhyme, and every page or so, there is mention of tickle time, and each time, I make sure to tickle the Goose. She asked me to read this one to her three times in a row yesterday, each time saying “Gitchy gitchy goo tickle!”

Stuart Little by E.B. White. This book has a special place in my heart because it is the first chapter book Magoo and I shared. I had never read it before, and I took the risk and didn’t preview it before reading it with her. In hindsight that wasn’t a good idea, but it turned out well. Each day, we would review what happened the day before and then start a new chapter. And she felt very important because she was reading a grown up book.

So that’s it. Our list of current favorites.

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