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The Rewards of Reading Together
When family members read aloud together, lots of good things happen - including learning, laughter and love.
by Don Hooser
Family members reading together is an ancient tradition that is being rediscovered with delight in many countries. Many families vouch for the importance and pleasure of reading aloud. It is a family activity par excellence.
At the same time, many people lack the ability or desire to read. Thus they read little. The situation can lead to a vicious circle. Lack of skill leads to lack of interest and enjoyment, and lack of enjoyment leads to lack of motivation to improve one's skill.
Most children learn to read well enough to get through school, but many of them stop reading any more than is necessary. Schools have produced school-time readers, but not lifetime readers. While teaching students how to read, they have failed to teach them to want to read.
Missing motivation
Why don't more people relish reading? The search for the answers to that question began in earnest with the 1955 publication of the book Why Johnny Can't Read. Since then much research has confirmed a major conclusion: Reluctant readers were not read to as children.
Since reading is the single most important skill in education, the National Commission of Reading formed in 1983 to study what works and what doesn't work in teaching reading. After two years of intensive research, in 1985 the commission's members published their report, Becoming a Nation of Readers. Note their conclusion: "The single most important activity . . . for eventual success in reading is reading aloud to children." If parents want their children to be readers, they need to read aloud to and with them.
Why is this so? First, success in many endeavors depends most of all on attitude. More than any other single activity, in or out of school, reading aloud has the greatest impact on building positive attitudes about books and reading.
A secondary reason is that regular reading aloud strengthens children's language skills-in reading, writing and speaking. Why is that so? Because it improves children's listening comprehension. Listening comprehension must come before reading comprehension.
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