Reading is not supposed to be thought of as a chore to your readers. Reading at home needs to be a relaxed choice where they can continue the practice of the independent reading skills you are developing in class.
Home reading should be an extension of your classroom independent reading. BUT...that is not an easy beast to control. And, let's face it, teachers are control freaks. Okay, maybe that's only me. But hear me out...
Teachers need to have control to run a successful classroom. It's not being a control freak. It's just being prepared for everything and being unapologetically organized with every tool possible within an arm's reach!
When we ask our readers to read at HOME, the control leaves our hands. You don't want the reading motivation, reading identity and self-worth in reading you have built up in each of your readers to disappear overnight! You don't want your hard work to be undone.
Parents have busy lives. Teachers have busy lives. And unfortunately, our readers are caught in the middle.
In most schools, reading is taught much differently than when our readers' parents (or grandparents) were in school. So, we have to make sure our parents and grandparents are equipped with the tools their readers will need at home. This is every reason schools should be offering a Family Literacy Night or Family Literacy Session. It's a good practice to offer this more than just once a school year. Just sayin...
✅If HOME reading is an extension of classroom independent reading, we have to make sure the parents understand what that looks like.
✅If HOME reading is an extension of classroom independent reading, we have to make sure the parents understand that reading choice is important every day!
✅If HOME reading is an extension of classroom independent reading, we have to make sure the parents understand that reading is not a chore!
✅If HOME reading is an extension of classroom independent reading, we have to make sure the parents understand that just sitting and reading something for fun is okay.
✅If HOME reading is an extension of classroom independent reading, we have to make sure the parents understand that having conversations about a text is important with readers of all ages.
✅If HOME reading is an extension of classroom independent reading, we have to make sure the parents understand how to initiate a conversation about reading with their child.
✅If HOME reading is an extension of classroom independent reading, we have to make sure the parents understand that reading is something that every person does every day.
It's so important to equip our parents with tangible and easy to use tools to encourage reading at home, as well as, tools to guide text conversations with their readers at home.
Creating a HOME Reading Toolkit can be unique to your set of readers based on their reading level and age group.
A HOME Reading Toolkit should have...
A Parent Letter with a reminder that reading is not a chore
Conversational prompts for the child and parent to use to discuss reading
Suggestions for how to read
Suggestions for what kind of reading activity to do
A Reading Record such as a Visual Bookshelf to keep collect titles of books (and other texts) read at home
A HOME Reading Toolkit can help boost your readers' motivation and confidence to read independently at home.
Until next time,
For more information about planning a Family Literacy Night, read my blog post, Simple Planning for the PERFECT Literacy Night for Parents where you can gain access to a FREE Planning Tool for your Family Literacy Night.