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Tips for Reluctant Readers

Wednesday 15th January 2020

 Top Tips for Reluctant Readers

Some children learn to read effortlessly and love every step of the journey, whilst others find it more of an uphill climb and will need extra encouragement and support along the way. Here are a few tips to help reluctant readers.
1. Most importantly, make sure you are in a good routine of reading regularly. This might sound obvious, but once a routine is established, children are much less likely to protest. Reading for 10 minutes every day after breakfast will become just as normal as brushing teeth.
2. Don’t push your child up reading levels too quickly just to keep up with peers. Children will gain confidence and are more likely to enjoy reading when they don’t have to struggle on too many words.
3. Don’t force children to read a book page by page if they don’t like it or if it is too difficult. Help them out by sharing the reading. Don’t be afraid to put a book aside completely and let them choose another.
4. Make the most of the reading opportunities in the world around you. Reluctant readers may prefer reading about a competition on a cereal box during breakfast, rather than getting a book out of their school bag.
5. Let children have more choice in the books that they read. Some may prefer to read just non-fiction books. (To find the right books at Reading Chest, go to ‘Our books’ where you will be able to search for books based on key words and add them to your 'Favourites'.)
6. Listen to audio books. Although children aren’t reading themselves, audio books are a fantastic way to keep stories alive and engage children in books that they might not be able to read confidently themselves.
7. Read and act out a play together. There are great plays included in some reading schemes now such as Bug Club and Collins Big Cat, which can be read and acted out.
8. Read more as a parent. Many of us will only read for a few minutes in bed before nodding off to sleep. Perhaps your children never see you reading a book.

The ultimate challenge for reluctant readers is getting them to read for their own pleasure rather than to please their parents or teacher. It is up to us to not only help children to develop the skills to read, but also more importantly the desire to want to do it. The best way in which we can do this is to ensure that it has a strong presence in their lives, and that they have access to enough inspiring content to keep them interested, engaged and entertained.