When I was a child, my greatest joy on the first day of summer vacation was to head for the public library and get a stack of as many books as they would allow me to borrow. Then I spent as much as a week enjoying all these books before heading back to the library to return these voraciously read books and get more. I also convinced my younger sister to get a stack of books which I would then read. Alas, although I was an enthusiastic reader, she was not. Of her stack of books, she maybe read one or two old favorites she borrowed over and over again. Rarely could I convince her to try something new.
As I have through the years worked with hundreds of gifted children of all ages, I have had to recognize that while there are many enthusiastic readers like I was as a child, there are also many who are more like my sister. In fact, there are many who never want to read anything at all. It doesn’t matter either how high their reading level is, some kids just don’t really enjoy reading.
It is important to distinguish if the child in question dislikes books, or if they also dislike stories. The child who dislikes reading books may do so for some less apparent reasons, which I will go into in a moment. The child who does not like stories, that is fiction, may prefer reading about facts, or may not like reading at all.
Let’s look first at the child who likes stories but not reading them in books. It may be that this child has underlying visual scanning or visual acuity issues that make reading difficult. They may have attention problems or memory issues. For example, as a child, I had undiagnosed ADHD and recalling what I read from chapter to chapter could be difficult. A high interest book, with shorter chapters, a book that was part of a series with the same characters and settings or a book that I was rereading all helped me to remember what I read and to enjoy the process of reading even though it was difficult at times. Other suggestions that can help are reading books somewhat lower than grade level, reading books that are popular with other children, and reading on a device that can adjust font size and type like a Kindle.
My more reluctant reader sister absolutely loved comic books. In those days there were new selections every week at the stationary store. We both spent a lot of our allowance on these books and read them over and over, sharing them with our parents who also liked comics. I also read the Classics Illustrated comics and frankly would not have gotten through high school English without having read the Classics Illustrated Ivanhoe and several other books I could not get through on my own.
These days, the graphic novel takes the place of the comic book. There are books written specifically in graphic form starting from easy readers on up to classics like Wuthering Heights and a lot of Jane Austin. A famous award-winning graphic novel, Maus, is well known in telling the story of the Holocaust. While not for younger children, those in middle school on up can read this famous book and its sequel. One graphic series that older children can enjoy is Rick Riordan’s Percy Jackson and the Olympians and this may help some children then tackle the books that have not been put into graphic form.
Audiobooks are another form of reading that can allow reluctant readers to experience the joy of stories even though they have difficulty with actual books. For some children getting books that allow for both reading and listening can be helpful as they can do both at once or switch back and forth.
Children who enjoy nonfiction, but not fiction, like facts. Some enjoy learning new things and reading nonfiction allows them to do so. Reading nonfiction is a good thing but some ability to read and understand fiction is important. Reading fiction allows for the development of emotional empathy and perspective taking. It also allows children and adults to think more broadly about emotionally based issues such as opinions versus facts. Finally, schools will require a certain amount of reading and analyzing of fiction, and the child who does not read fiction will be at a disadvantage.
Thus, in addition to reading fact-based nonfiction, it can be important to introduce reluctant children to fiction. Using biographies can be a start but then adding books on topics of high interest in fictionalized form can be important, such as reading historical fiction or science fiction. Stories in areas of high interest can also be a start, for example, fiction stories about people engaged in the child’s interest.
Parents can introduce children to books by reading aloud with them, listening to an audiobook together, reading a book and then seeing a movie based on the book, looking for a graphic novel and finding books that will hold the interest of a child with shorter attention. These can be books with short chapters, cliff hangers, mysteries, action-based books like sports novels, or books that follow an adventure, for example, a story about an undersea or outer space adventure.
Finally, there are some tricks that readers can use to help themselves get through a more difficult book. One is to see how long it is and divide it up into sections to read. Even as an adult I find this to be helpful in starting a new book. I also look at illustrations and pictures. Reading the inside flap on a book cover as well as title headings can give an idea of what the book will be about. If it is a book where I will need to recall information later, for example for a book club or class, I can take notes of characters and things that happen, so I remember.
Parents can help set reading goals and pair reading the book with a reward. Our public library had a summer reading program that gave awards for numbers of books read during July and August. Since there were no quizzes, they based this on the number of books you took out. Thus, if you took out the same book 10 times, it counted the same as if you took out 10 books. This helped my sister a lot to win the yearly award. Some public libraries still have such summer reading programs and they are worth checking out.
Parents can set smaller goals than a month’s worth of reading and give rewards based on books read or listened to. For example, renting the movie, going to a museum that has artifacts like in the story, having a book dessert that the child helps to make, or simply going out for ice cream, or a pizza can be good incentives. While reluctant readers may never turn into enthusiastic readers, some children may surprise you. My reluctant sister ended up becoming a librarian. Who knew! At the very least, becoming familiar with how books tell stories can only benefit the child in school later, if not in negotiating some of the difficulties of life without giving up.