Momo celebrating time to read: Talking

Showing posts with label Talking. Show all posts

Saturday, July 12, 2025

The Superpower that Might Matter Most by Richard Glover SMH Spectrum

Reading books to children is good for everyone involved.

I'm giving them a gift.

Later they will also read to themselves, way past bedtime, pretending to be asleep before slipping the light back on and feasting on one, or five, more chapters.

Thank you, Richard Glover, for sharing the joy and importance of reading aloud to your precious grandchildren. This piece, by Richard Glover in the Sydney Morning Herald today (12th July 2025 Subscriber link), is a perfect follow on from another that appeared last Saturday "Is it goodnight for the bedtime story?" by Lauren Ironmonger. (SMH Subscriber link) and from my blog post where I responded to another SMH piece entitled "The Final Chapter".

If I could make one change to the heading of this SMH Spectrum piece, I would delete the word MIGHT because this does matter and it matters SO much. Sorry for all the shouting.

So, thinking about this topic first off, I am going to share a couple of personal examples from just this week.

Example one: Lifeline run bookfairs in my area four times each year and I try to attend all of them. I especially love going through all the endless boxes of children's books because I find treasures but even more, I love doing this when I have a purpose. This week my friend needed books for her grandkid's preschool which is in a small, remote, northern NSW town. Easy! I found 35 fantastic picture books for just AUS$1 each. I know lots of these will now be read aloud to kids in the preschool and hopefully, if they have a home lending program, which you find in some preschools, a few of these books might even feature as nighttime read alouds - well that's my dream. It was also wonderful to see so many people at the fair and especially young mothers with tiny children filling up bags and strollers with piles of books.

Second example: Another friend of mine spends one day a week with her great nephew. He recently turned one. When my friend was a child, her dad read aloud every night so it is very natural for the aunt to read to this little fellow AND their house is filled with books AND even better this young fellow has learned one very important word - BOOK. He is so happy when his mum or dad or my friend sit with him on the lounge to read and reread his own favourite books.

Third example: Another grandmother friend of mine asked her now 21-year-old granddaughter if there was a book she would like. This grandmother is a former bookseller and is a book reviewer and also a children's literature academic. Her house is filled to the brim with books. Her granddaughter asked for a specific book but she didn't remember the title - just the essence of the story - luckily this fragment was enough for her grandmother. The book was located and special memories of reading this book over a decade ago were shared. (If you are curious I have put the cover of this book at the bottom of this post).

Parents - can I just say you are truly missing out on something so easy to do with your child and if you borrow books from a library this a FREE activity and it is something you can do over and over again and you will build a beautiful relationship with your young reading companion and WOW isn't this so much better than screen time. AND this is the kind of activity, reading aloud to your child every day, that can easily fit into your daily routine - surely you have ten minutes to read a picture book. I am going to say that again - surely you have ten minutes to read a book to your child AND this is an activity that can become addictive in absolutely the best sense of that word.

One of the biggest things I miss from working in my former school library, now that I have retired, is reading aloud to the children (of all ages from 5-12). Just like Richard, I used to love using all the voices in books. This week I talked about or revisited some old books that I read hundreds of times: The Pumpkin Man and the Crafty Creeper (Margaret Mahy); Jandy Malone and the Nine O'Clock Tiger (Barbara Bolton); O'Diddy (Joceyln Stevenson); Jeremiah in the Dark Woods (Alan Ahlberg); and of course, my all-time best ever read aloud Chilly Billy (Peter Mayle) and many many more.

I always gift books to new families in the hope that, in these families, reading a book will become a natural part of every day. This week I also talked about the revised book from Megan Daley - Raising Readers - a must read book for all parents.

Here are a few quotes from Richard Glover:

"Oh my god, I love reading aloud."
"Who doesn't like reading books to kids?"
"Fun for me is precisely the phrase I'd use, whether it's the memories of reading to my own children decades ago or reading to those children's children. Often the same books, the pages all torn and tatty."
(I need to say it is a wonderful thing to see a book all torn and tatty because this is a book that has 'lived' and not lingered on a shelf).
"What's so good about reading aloud? The child ... is sitting still ... sitting calmy, head leaning on your shoulder, entranced. What's not to love?"
"Books give you a shortcut into understanding the personality of the child."
"One of the defining divisions of the future, some say, will be between those who have the concentration span to read a book (and therefore complete other life tasks) and those who need fresh stimulation every few minutes."
"Together with their parents, I may be helping develop the one superpower that will matter."

I do wish, in a way, that Richard had not cited Toby by Margaret Wild as an example - although of course his piece is personal. I love that he shared an authentic reading experience but this is a book that, as a parent, you do need to read it first just to check that it is okay for your child. I worked with a colleague years ago who lost a family dog who looked just like Toby. She couldn't even pick up this book or put it back on a shelf.

Richard also mentions (in case you are compiling a list) The Gruffalo (Julia Donaldson); Big Ted (a book based on the television program Play School); and Where the wild things are (Maurice Sendak)

I have been 'banging on" about this topic for years. My blog is called Momotimetoread because I had way too many kindy kids returning books to my school library only to tell me 'mummy or daddy or whoever didn't have time to read it!' That is heart wrenching and I am going to say something even stronger - not reading to your child is a form of terrible neglect.

POST UPDATE - check out the blog post from my friend at Kinderbookswitheverything. Her response reflects her deep thinking and experience with this important topic of reading aloud to children (of all ages).

Reading with children is precious time, time that you will not get back!

Here are a few recent posts about the importance of reading to children:

Tuesday, June 10, 2025

Aidan Chambers questions

TELL ME, Children, Reading and Talk, Aidan Chambers, Thimble Press

Was there anything you liked about this book?
Was there anything you disliked about this book?
Was there anything that puzzled you?
Were there any patterns-any connections- that you noticed?

THE BASIC QUESTIONS
 Was there anything you liked about this book?
 What especially caught your attention?
 What would you have liked more of?
 Was there anything you disliked about this book?
 Were there parts that bored you?
 Did you skip parts? Which ones?
 If you gave up, where did you stop and what stopped you?
 Was there anything that puzzled you?
 Was there anything you thought strange?
 Was there anything that you’d never found in a book before?
 Was there anything that took you completely by surprise?
 Did you notice any apparent inconsistencies?
 Were there any patterns-any connections- that you noticed?

THE GENERAL QUESTIONS
 When you first saw this book, even before you read it, what kind of book did you think it would be?
 What made you think this?
 Now you’ve read it, is it as you expected?
 Have you read other books like it?
 How is this one the same?
 How is it different ?
 Have you read this book before? [If so:] Was it different this time?
 Did you notice anything this time you didn’t notice the first time?
 Did you enjoy it more or less?
 Because of what happened to you when reading it again, would you recommend other people to read it more than once, or isn’t it worth it?
 While you were reading, or now when you think about it, were there words or phrases or other things to do with the language that you liked? Or didn’t like?
 You know how, when people speak, they often use some words or phrases or talk in away that you recognise as theirs: are some words or phrases used like that in this book?
 Have you noticed anything special about the way language is used in this book?
 If the writer asked you what could be improved in the book, how would you have made it better?
 [Alternatively] If you had written this book, how would you have made it better?
 Has anything that happens in the book ever happened to you?
 In what ways was it the same or different for you?
 Which parts in the book seem to you to be most true to life?
 Did the book make you think differently about your own similar experience?
 When you were reading, did you ‘see’ the story happening in your imagination?
 Which details –which passages- helped you ‘see’ it best?
 Which passages stay in your mind most vividly?
 How many different stories [kinds of story] can you find in this story? Was this a book you read quickly, or slowly? In one go, or in separate sessions?
 Would you like to read it again?
 What will you tell your friends about this book?
 What won’t you tell them because it might spoil the book for them? Or might mislead them about what it is like?
 Do you know people who you think would especially like it?
 What would you suggest I tell other people about it that will help them decide whether they want to read it or not? Older than you? Younger?
 How should I give it to them? For example, should I read it aloud or tell them about it and let them read it for themselves?
 Is it a good thing to talk about it after we’ve all read it?
 We’ve listened to each other’s thoughts and heard all sorts of things that each of us has noticed.
Are you surprised by anything?
 Has anyone said anything that has changed your mind in any way about this book? Or helped you
understand it better?
 Tell me about the things people said that struck you the most.
 When you think about the book now, after all we’ve said, what is the most important thing about
it for you?
 Does anyone know anything about the writer? Or about how the story came to be written? Or
where? Or when? Would you like to find out?

THE SPECIAL QUESTIONS
 How long did it take the story to happen?
 Did we find out about the story in the order in which the events happened?
 When you talk about things that happen to you, do you always tell your story in the order in which they happened? Or are there sometimes reasons why you don’t? What are the reasons?
 Are there parts of the story that took a long time to happen but were told about quickly or in a few
words? And are there parts that happened very quickly but took a lot of space to tell about?
 Were there parts that took the same time to tell as they would have taken to happen?
 Where did the story happen?
 Did it matter where it was set? Could it just as well been set anywhere? Or could it have been better set somewhere else?
 Did you think about the place as you were reading?
 Are there passages in the book that are especially about the place that the story is set? What did you
like, or dislike, about them?
 Was the setting interesting in itself? Would you like to know more about it?
 Which character interested you the most?
 Is that character the most important in the story/ Or is it really about someone else?
 Which character(s) didn’t you like?
 Did any of the characters remind you of people you know?
 Or remind you of characters in other books?
 Was there anyone not mentioned in the story but without whom it couldn’t have happened?
 Can you think of any reason why s/he doesn’t appear or isn’t mentioned?
 Would the story have been the same if s/he had appeared or been mentioned?
 Who was telling – narrating – the story? Do we know? And how do we know?
 Is the story told in the first person (and if so, who is this person)? Or the third person? By
someone we know about in the story or by someone we know or don’t know about outside the
story?
 What does the person telling the story – the narrator – think or feel about the characters? Does s/he like
or dislike them? How do you know?
 Does the narrator approve or disapprove of the things that happen and that the characters do? Do you
approve or disapprove of them?
 Think of yourself as a spectator. With whose eyes did you see the story? Did you only se what
one character in the story saw, or did you see things sometimes as one character saw them, and
sometimes as another and so on?
 Were you as it were, inside the head of one of the characters, only knowing what s/he knew, or did the
story take you inside a number of characters?
 Did we ever get to know what the characters were thinking about? Were we ever told what they
were feeling? Or was the story told all the time from outside the characters, watching what they
did and hearing what they said, but never knowing what they were thinking and feeling?
 When you were reading the story, did you feel it was happening now? Or did you feel it was happening
in the past and being remembered? Can you tell me anything in the writing that made you feel like that?
 Did you feel as if everything was happening to you, as if you were an observer, watching what was
happening but not part of the action?
 If you were an observer, where were you watching from? Did you seem to watch from different places- sometimes, perhaps from besides the characters, sometimes from above them as if you were in a
helicopter? Can you tell me places in the book where you felt like that?

Saturday, June 1, 2024

Listen, Hippo! by Gabriel Evans

"Billy was having a bad day. ... Billy wished there was someone he could talk to."

He tells his friend Hippo that he is feeling sad and that his brain is whirling like a pinwheel but Hippo is not listening properly. Hippo sees himself as the master of fun. He suggests dressing up, dancing, climbing a tree, sailing on the high seas or perhaps a magic carpet ride will help or a party with cake!

No no no. Billy just wants someone to listen. Finally, Hippo stops all this activity and he notices Billy is sad. He makes two mugs of hot chocolate with extra marshmallows and the pair of friends sit down on the comfy couch and Billy is able to talk.

Here is an audio interview with Gabriel Evans. This interview is with Good Reading Magazine. Joy Lawn talks to Gabriel for her blog Paperbark Words. You can see more books by Gabriel Evans who lives in Western Australia on his own web page.

Listen, Hippo is a special book that you could share side by side with your young reading companion. I think that would work better than sharing this book with a big group of children in a library. Then perhaps you might stop and listen to your own child and ask if they have feelings or fears that they need to share. I also suggest making a delicious hot chocolate to sip while you are reading. Oh, and I do hope you love the final page (no spoilers) - it certainly made me smile.

Companion books:

The Rabbit Listened

Other books by Gabriel Evans - pop each title into my side bar for more details or click his name at the bottom of this post or read this post which I penned after meet Gabriel at Gleebooks here in Sydney.

Sunday, December 10, 2023

Read aloud to your child every day!

Seven very important words - Read aloud to your child every day!

#readaloudtoyourchildeveryday

Yesterday I went to a baby shower, and I was thrilled to see that the new mum-to-be was gifted several children's books (a big pile from me too, of course) including Mem Fox Time for Bed; books from the That's not my series; and Magic Beach by Alison Lester. The sister of the mum-to-be organised a Nursery Rhyme quiz but only the older family members and friends had any idea about these famous rhymes. I was pleased that I also gifted the new baby a large Nursery Rhyme book, but I do hope the young friends also discover these and read them aloud when they start their own family.

See the full list of 81 titles here

Last week I read about this wonderful promotion by the CBCA in Tasmania. I am in awe of this idea and huge initiative. I am sure the CBCA in Tasmania are just a small organisation but they have created an eye-catching banner (and added my logo WOW). They are aiming to raise awareness far and wide about the vital importance of reading to children every day. I hope other branches of the CBCA take up this idea too!

Years ago, when I spoke to groups of new parents in my school I always shared a tiny book by Rosemary Wells and now I quote part of her text on every baby card.

Read to your bunny often,

It's twenty minutes of fun.

It's twenty minutes of moonlight,

And twenty minutes of sun.

Twenty old-favorite minutes,

Twenty minutes brand-new,

Read to your bunny often,

And . . .

Your bunny will read to you.

"The Tasmanian Branch, Children’s Book Council of Australia, partnering with Toast for Kids Charity Inc., are proud to launch the national campaign “Read Aloud to Your Child Every Day”, a simple message encouraging parents, grandparents, siblings and carers to read to their children for their literary growth and education; investing in their future.

Recently released NAPLAN data (see ABC News report) showed that one in three school students throughout Australia are not meeting minimum numeracy and literacy expectations, and one in ten are so far behind they need additional support. Furthermore, over decades Tasmania continues to suffer from an illiteracy rate of 50%. Informed by these facts, we are championing our cause to develop a culture of “Read Aloud to Your Child Every Day”, locally, state-wide and nationally.

We are commencing a national campaign, reaching out to institutes, governments, schools, parent groups, agencies, not for profits, speech pathologists, writers’ groups, book and reading advocates, presenting the opportunity to partner with the effort, adopting and promoting the one message:

“Read Aloud to Your Child Every Day”."

I have talked about this issue of reading to children in previous posts:

Can you see the ducks Mummy?

In that post I said: I dream of creating an advertising campaign where I share the importance of reading to and with children and the importance of talking to children and the importance of putting that phone away so parents, and other adults can pay attention to their child. I deeply worry about the generation of children who have been ignored while their parents give all of their focus to small screens.

Reading to Preschoolers - five blog posts:

Take a look at the ten read aloud commandments from Mem Fox (author of Possum Magic and Koala Lou and heaps of other wonderful books).

Here is my former library slogan (I saw it in a Canadian elementary school in 1994):

Now for some books for parents. Many of the really good ones are sadly long out of print - Babies need books by Dorothy Butler; and Reading Magic by Mem Fox. These three are worth finding:

Read more here

Read my blog post about Raising Readers

I am including this even though I have not read it myself but the authors are very well respected.

Monday, March 28, 2022

Can you see the ducks mummy?

Image Source: Wikipedia

A friend of mine shared a Facebook post today which deeply resonated with me. Being a good Teacher-Librarian I decided to dig a little deeper to find the original source of this post. My friend quoted a post by Jean-François Gignac (4th January 2020) and in turn Jean-François was quoting Dr. Ovid a paediatric neurologist. When I hunted down the article I discovered it all originated on a blog post by Victoria Prooday, Occupational Therapist.

I am going to quote a few words from this piece that I think others need to read. Just before I do that take a look at the title of my post - Can you see the ducks mummy? I live near a lake and there are lots of ducks sitting on the shore in the sun or paddling on the lake often surrounded by tiny fluffy chicks. Every day I walk along the lake path and every day I see parents, and sometimes grandparents too, so completely distracted by their phones that when little children ask questions and exclaim with delight on seeing the lake ducks the child is ignored. I weep. A beautiful opportunity for a conversation, for an interaction, for a shared experience is lost and lost forever.

I dream of creating an advertising campaign where I share the importance of reading to and with children and the importance of talking to children and the importance of putting that phone away so parents, and other adults can pay attention to their child. I deeply worry about the generation of children who have been ignored while their parents give all of their focus to small screens.

My other impetus for this post comes from the regular comments I hear from colleagues who are deeply worried about the children in their care. Children who have no curiosity. Young children who are unsettled, distracted or just tired. Students who today seem to have such limited knowledge of words. My Teacher-Librarian friends are finding, when they read to the children in the library, they have to stop to explain or clarify the meaning of words, words that in previous years children readily understood. And there are other issues, way beyond the scope of this blog post, connected with the children's own use of phones and other devices - viewing inappropriate content; cyber bullying; body image; eye damage; limited time given to exercise; no time set aside for reading or talking; and more.

Now back to the article:

Title: The silent tragedy affecting today’s children

Today's children are being over-stimulated and over-gifted with material objects, but they are deprived of the fundamentals of a healthy childhood, such as:

Emotionally available parents
Clearly defined limits
Responsibilities
Balanced nutrition and adequate sleep
Movement in general but especially OUTDOORS
Creative play, social interaction, unstructured game opportunities and boredom spaces

Instead, in recent years, children have been filled with:

Digitally distracted parents
Indulgent and permissive parents who let children "rule the world" and whoever sets the rules
A sense of right, of deserving everything without earning it or being responsible for obtaining it
Inadequate sleep and unbalanced nutrition
A sedentary lifestyle
Endless stimulation, technological nannies, instant gratification and absence of boring moments

What can we do?

The article gives some good advice to parents. I won't quote all of it here just a few of the important points:

Spend at least one hour a day outdoors doing activities such as: cycling, walking, fishing, bird / insect watching
Implement a consistent sleep routine to ensure your child gets enough sleep. The schedules will be even more important for school-age children.
Teach them to wait and delay gratification.
Provide opportunities for "boredom", since boredom is the moment when creativity awakens.
Do not feel responsible for always keeping children entertained.
Do not use technology as a cure for boredom, nor offer it at the first second of inactivity.
Avoid using technology during meals, in cars, restaurants, shopping centres. Use these moments as opportunities to socialise by training the brains to know how to work when they are in mode: "boredom"
Turn off the phones at night when children have to go to bed to avoid digital distraction.
Connect emotionally - smile, hug, kiss, tickle, read, dance, jump, play or crawl with them.

And to this list I am going to add - read to your child. Read every day. Read books of all kinds - funny books, serious books, books with scrumptious art, non fiction, old books, new books - just go to your library and grab a bunch of books and plan to do this every week or two. And I will add talk with your child too.

Here the ten Mem Fox Read Aloud commandments:

Spend at least ten wildly happy minutes every single day reading aloud. From birth!
Read at least three stories a day: it may be the same story three times. Children need to hear a thousand stories before they can begin to learn to read. Or the same story a thousand times!
Read aloud with animation. Listen to your own voice and don’t be dull, or flat, or boring. Hang loose and be loud, have fun and laugh a lot.
Read with joy and enjoyment: real enjoyment for yourself and great joy for the listeners
Read the stories that your child loves, over and over, and over again, and always read in the same ‘tune’ for each book: i.e. with the same intonations and volume and speed, on each page, each time.
Let children hear lots of language by talking to them constantly about the pictures, or anything else connected to the book; or sing any old song that you can remember; or say nursery rhymes in a bouncy way; or be noisy together doing clapping games
Look for rhyme, rhythm or repetition in books for young children, and make sure the books are really short.
Play games with the things that you and the child can see on the page, such as letting kids finish rhymes, and finding the letters that start the child’s name and yours, remembering that it’s never work, it’s always a fabulous game.
Never ever teach reading, or get tense around books.
Please read aloud every day because you just adore being with your child, not because it’s the right thing to do.

Read to your bunny often,

It's twenty minutes of fun.

It's twenty minutes of moonlight,

And twenty minutes of sun.

Twenty old-favorite minutes,

Twenty minutes brand-new,

Read to your bunny often,

And . . .

Your bunny will read to you.

Sunday, January 8, 2017

Fly Away by Patricia MacLachlan

One of the books that 'made me' such a huge fan of children's books is Sarah Plain and Tall because of the emotional impact it had on me. There is a link, too, between Sarah Plain and Tall and this new book - the power of singing.

When I saw a 'new' title Fly Away (2014) by Patricia MacLachlan mentioned on a list of books for our younger readers I knew I wanted to get my hands on it straight away so yesterday I traveled to a bookshop in the city. I read the whole book straight away and it did not disappoint me. This is a short book but it explores huge emotions in a lyrical and truthful way.

One of the connections I made with this book Fly Away was the mention of a Dutch Belted cow. We have a picture book in our library called Clancy the Courageous Cow. Clancy is a Belted Galloway. I thought they were 'made up' for the book until I was on a bus tour in Massachusetts and the guide told us to look out the window because we were passing a farm with heritage livestock included Belted Galloways. Sadly I did not see them that day but the following year I did see some in UK and I was very excited. I now discover that the Dutch Belted is a milking cow and the Belted Galloway is a beef cow which comes from the cross breeding of Galloways with the Dutch Belted. Here is a Dutch Belted.

Lucy and her family need to travel across Minnesota to visit Aunt Frankie. "She lives by a big river that floods in the rainy season. It is now the rainy season ... " The family consists of Lucy and her two younger siblings Grace aged six and Teddy aged two. Mum is called Maggie and Dad is called Boots "because he wears them." Dad is a opera and poetry fan and mum loves Langhorne Slim. I had not heard of him but he is a real singer (see below).

Lucy and Teddy have a very special relationship. Teddy is not yet talking but Lucy knows he can sing. Teddy calls Lucy "See" and each night just before they fall asleep Teddy sings to Lucy. Lucy cannot sing in tune but she has other talents including writing poetry.

Here are a few quotes from the story :

"I have known for a long time that Teddy can sing perfectly in tune even though he not yet two. We all know he doesn't speak words yet. But only Teddy and I know that he sings."

"Here is my secret: I am planning to be a poet. ... When I get to be a poet Boots will be pleased. He will be proud. And one day, for him, I will write a poem as beautiful as a cow."

"Sometimes I think Teddy knows everything."

Here is a list of the music in this book :