Archive for 2015
An important Back to School conversation for parents and children
August 25, 2015
One of the biggest challenges for parents is to be able to tolerate their children’s mistakes and failures, giving them the necessary space to fail. Avoiding experiences in which you might make a mistake may be the biggest mistake of all. The ideal to strive for is not to avoid making mistakes, but to be […]
Reading is more than just a nice thing to do with kids
August 18, 2015
Reading to young children is associated with good outcomes and new studies tell us a little more about what actually happens when you read a picture book to a small child. A recent study found more brain activity depending on how much the children had been read to at home. The part of the brain […]
Lucky the children who have parents and extended family and friends who read to them
August 11, 2015
I just received an email from a mother who took a children’s literature class with me when her children were young. Now they are in college but they have not forgotten the pleasure their favorite picture books of long ago offered and they certainly remember the love that came along with being read to. The […]
Summertime and reading go together like ice cream and a cone
August 6, 2015
Summer time reading liberates reading from the long list of assignments that often accompany reading during the school year. The tyranny of the assignment— Read for 20 minutes Keep a journal of your reading Answer these questions Write a book report— Assignments so often rob the pleasure out of reading. Lets hear it for— Read […]
Parents face a challenge to overcome the ubiquitous presence of screen technology.
July 27, 2015
A recent article in the WSJ The Great Gifts of Reading Aloud was a nice wake-up call about the importance of reading aloud to children. It made me think what a daunting challenge parents face today to overcome the ubiquitous presence of screen technology. A dad recently shared with me his personal experience of reading […]
