How to motivate child to read?

“Today a reader, tomorrow a leader.” – Margaret Fuller

We all have some of the other special memories of the books that have motivated us and have learned the profound effect that reading the right book can have at the right moment.

Books have immense power to transition us to new worlds and different time zones, but they can also take us back to the important moments in our own lives. From building our vocabulary to help reduce our stress, preventing age-related cognitive decline, and increasing our ability to empathize, reading books is one of the simplest and soothing ways to look after our mind, body, and soul.

Books play a quintessential role in everyone's life by introducing them to a world of imagination, providing knowledge of the outside world, improving their reading, writing, and speaking skills as well as enhancing our memory and wisdom.

There are multiple ways that books make difference in our lives — they give us a glimpse of how other people live & respond to things happening around us, they broaden our views, mold our thoughts on politics and social issues, they show us how to become better with a better perspective and sometimes help us to navigate through any loneliness we may feel in our lives.

If you think a little more about it, you will realize that all the stories in the world are essentially made up of standard 26 letters. The letters are always the same, only their combinations vary. From letters, words are formed, from words sentences, from sentences chapters, and from chapters stories.

We all live in the same world, but we see it through different filters. Life is enriched when we come alongside others and genuinely attempt to see life from their perspective. A book gives us the opportunity to experience life through another lens.

Reading has been shown to put our brains into a pleasurable trance-like state, like meditation, and it brings the same health benefits of deep relaxation and inner calm. Regular readers sleep better, have lower stress levels, higher self-esteem, and lower rates of depression than non-readers.

While we understand the importance of good reading once we grow, it becomes of utmost importance to introduce reading habits to our children starting from an early age, and below are a few methods which can help them build some interest in good reading.

 For Ages: 2- 5 years

Fairy tales are more than true: not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us that dragons can be beaten ~ Neil Gaiman

Choose to read either every evening before bed or just after dinner, but make sure you make a daily habit out of reading.

Children know perfectly well that unicorns aren’t real, but they also know that books about unicorns, if they are good books, are true books. My younger one loves to read fairy tales with small stories with incredible illustrations, something like - Aesop's Fables Jumbo Picture Book or books from most beloved author Ruskin Bond. Books with excellent visualization and small entertaining stories can help children develop interests in reading. 

Go for books with augmented reality and 3D concepts. Augmented Reality is truly an amazing idea that literally comes to life as you take a journey like my recent buy on Deep oceans. Was amazed to see the detailed information which kept my child engrossed in the mystical lands of the ocean. Augmented reality is indeed a great way of teaching facts to your children.

For Ages: 5- 7 years

Create a game for the book-Send kids on a treasure hunt, the treasure being a book. Leave clues that lead them around the house to discover it in an unexpected place. The clues could be related to the book as well, its characters, or scenarios just to create some buzz before they start reading it. The magic of discovering a book at the end of the hunt will show your kids how valuable they can be.

Offer books like toys, Have them around the house. Keep one in your bag. If your child is throwing tantrums or dragging on your leg, pull out a book. It won’t always be what they want, but any distraction helps.

Especially puzzle and brain-boosting activity books, they are an amazing gateway for child’s creativity and to channelize their energy. These books include plenty of activities, such as solving mazes, matching the pairs, finding the differences, dot-to-dot, and more. Each activity of these kinds of books promotes the brain development and learning skills of young children

Let them develop their own taste and interests, accept that your kids have different reading tastes. Captain America might not be your interest, but your six-year-old will probably think otherwise.

I often tell my children, read, read, read. read everything — trash, classics, good and bad, and see how they do it. Just like a carpenter who works as an apprentice and studies the master. Read! You’ll absorb it. Then write. If it’s good, you’ll find out. If it’s not, throw it out of the window.

 For Ages: 8- 13 years

Shop together, my elder one and I love to go shopping and then browse the bookshelves.

Gift books and more books: Books are keepsakes that never age like toys and fads do. Wrap up a book or present a gift certificate to a local book shop so the birthday kid can pick his own.

            Lead by example, be around your children and away from gadgets, and get yourself               too involved while they read. In case you are tired and don’t want to pick up any  

             regular book, destress yourself by doing some Mandala Art or some 

             other adult coloring books.

Let us read and let us dance; these two amusements will never do any harm to the world.

A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies… the man who never reads lives only one.

I love books. I adore everything about them. I love the feel of the pages on my fingertips. They are light enough to carry, yet so heavy with worlds and ideas. I love the sound of the pages flicking against my fingers. Print against fingerprints. Books make people quiet, yet they are so loud ~Nnedi Okorafor

Last but not least do not push children too much to read, enable them with good books and create the right environment. They themselves would feel motivated and start enjoying reading and exploring more and more books.

Happy Reading!!

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