Magic and mystery in the turn of a page
I recall as a teenager sitting in school assembly listening to the principal read us an article on books in the new millennium. The child in the story read all their books on a small, handheld screen. She was puzzled when her grandmother told her that books had once been made of paper. She lovingly described the feel of turning pages and how satisfied she'd felt as the thickness of the book moved from the right-hand to the left.
In the early 1980s, the notion of a bookless society seemed so farfetched. Almost 30 years later, I see paper useage on the decline directly in relation to the increasing use of computers, but I still can't see books disappearing from the landscape completely. Well, I hope not, anyway.
For one thing, a summer holiday would never be the same without a novel to wade through. It's part of what makes it a break, the fact that you can lose yourself in another world, sitting on a sun lounger leafing through the pages. Besides, the sunlight would make it too hard to read the laptop or iphone screen.
And what about the wee ones who are starting to read? When our kids were preschoolers they wondered excitedly what the next page might have on it. Often, if the book was an old fave, they already knew, but that, too, was exciting because that brought a certain level of power and control ... particularly when the adult seemed to
forget what came next. When you're one or two you may not be able to read, but you can turn the pages with great aplomb.
Year one readers come home in the book bag every day in our household and the nightly bedtime routine is the reading aloud of the book. It's a lovely, enforced one-on-one session we look forward to in a busy household.
Recently, some info was sent to us by "Read to Your Kids'', a campaign that promotes the benefits of family reading. Its noble aims encourage and support parents reading to their kids, improve adult awareness of their responsibility as literacy role models and improve the quality of family life along the way. The campaign's booklet made fine reading in itself on the benefits of reading, suggestions for what to read and when, recommended book lists, and some ideas and inspiration to get you going. It included a wider look at what makes a great Kiwi kid and 20 things to do with your children that cost very little.
There was a good Dr Seuss quote in there: "The more that you read, the more things you will know. The more that you learn, the more places you'll go''. Too true. I love those mad Seuss books. I have been heard to say, "No, I do not like them, Sam I am'' in reference to things other than green eggs and ham. It means I am sick of hearing the same request over and over.
Still, the electronic screen does have a place in the mix. Our youngest has found the reading Eggs website to be great fun. It has made learning to read completely interactive and rewarding in a way that is different to a book. She has gathered little rewards in the form of animated characters related to the letters she has learned about as she "eggsplors'' her way through the paths on the sites' reading maps.
Absorbing information by being able to read well is a vital skill, more so now than ever. In my days at school it was all about finding the information, then regurgitating it in exams.
Now, there are no worries about finding information. All we need do is type a few words into a search engine which finds what we need fairly deftly. But what use is this sea of information if we cannot make sense of it?
The only way to do so is to have a decent level of literacy to call upon ... which starts off with parents reading to our kids.
Helpful websites for parents wanting to improve their children's reading skills are:
www.readtoyourkids.co.nz and www.readingeggs.com
