To buy my kids a kindle?

[BusyDog]

I have 4 children, the ones who can read are 6, 11 and 12. Book storage in our (fairly small) house is a real issue. I’m considering getting the older 3 kindles. I feel like I’m being a snob but I prefer real books, but really already books are taking over and it’s difficult as limited storage space and none they want to get rid of.
Yes, I know there’s the library but we can’t get there often… and they like to read a lot. Older 2 especially are keen for more books but storing them is a nightmare.
Is it worth getting Amazon kids +, kindle unlimited? Are there lots of popular authors on there, Enid Blyton, Rick Riordan etc? How do you find it works out cost wise?

Also, I assume books/ membership can be shared across kindles?

YABU = kindles suck. Real books all the way.
YANBU = buy kindle

How can this be true when they look exactly the same? The only difference is paper paper vs electronic paper.

I'm not an expert, but it's something to do with turning physical pages that helps a child's brain map where things happen in the story, making details easier to recall. Also, digital devices apparently encourage a "shallow reading" habit (skimming) because children are exposed to digital distractions (buttons and icons etc.)

A university in Spain published a review in 2023 which analysed data from 470,000 children aged 5-12, and found that reading printed text was up to six times more effective at boosting comprehension skills than digital reading.

We are a very book-ish household and I'm sure we would all read with or without kindles.......

My 9 year old has had a kindle for a few years and its perfect for her. I do buy her a lot of kindle books, and I am sure there are cheaper ways to do it, but it works really well for us.

She reads about a book a week, more in the summer. The kindle is brilliant for bedtime, she just reads until she is sleepy. We also usually have an audio book on the go, and graphic novels we buy as paper.

Her older siblings also had kindles (bought when we travelled a lot) and they are now adults, in very good universities studying science, and both remain avid fiction readers. One prefers a kindle (and shares my library) and the other prefers paper.

I prefer a kindle, I find the font gets bigger as the day gets on :). I love being able to have the book I want the moment I want it - its stuff of my bookish childhood dreams. I want to like paper books more, but I don't. My kids all comprehend text just fine, despite each reading 100s of books on kindles.

Oo, can you link me to a full description of how?! I miss library books on my kobo. Though automatic through libby was magic.

Can you link to the specific study?

My initial search suggests the study conflated all reading on any digital device with reading books. So does not explicitly show that reading books on an ereader is worse. More that often on other digital devices, children are reading shorter pieces and skimming, when it has been shown that reading longer and more complex books as they develop is important. That can still happen on an ereader.

And mine has no buttons/icons when I'm reading.

There's also evidence that suggests this only applies to backlit screens like tablets and computers, and not to e-ink displays like you get on an e-reader.

In case it's useful to anyone you can use a Kindle Fire to download books from Borrowbox. It's very straightforward.

Also, digital devices apparently encourage a "shallow reading" habit (skimming) because children are exposed to digital distractions (buttons and icons etc.)

That isn't the case for e-readers. They're specifically designed be distraction-free, and they mimic the experience of reading on a page.

They also have some specific advantages over paper books, which is that you can adjust the typeface, spacing and size of the text. That can make a lot of difference to the fluency with which people read, especially kids. For example, some dyslexic people find it much easier to read on an e-reader for that very reason: they can select the typeface that helps them most.

I like paper books a lot but honestly, provided it's a proper e-reader rather than a tablet-style device, kids' reading habits are not going to be ruined by a Kindle or a Kobo.

Kindle Fire is a tablet rather than an e-reader. You can read on it, but it's not an e-reader as such.

We love our Kindles! I have several different models, DD1(7) has her own one too. Really handy for holidays particularly but also reading in bed, she can increase the font size when she’s a bit tired, the in-built dictionary is useful too. E-ink is great, she can read it outside in garden, it looks just like a book page.

Definitely wouldn’t advocate for reading books on a standard tablet. Totally different experience, and not nice on the eyes!

I have a kindle because our home is at least 100 times too small for storing the number of books I have in physical form. Get the kindles!

Thank you everyone!! I’ve decided to be practical and get them a kindle, most new books will be bought via this instead of physical copies. Kindle is cheaper than a Kobo which saves around £130 when buying 3… I can buy a few new ebooks each on the kindle and still be spending less than a Kobo without books. Would kids or regular be best for my 11 and 12 year olds? Assuming kids for my 6 year old?
Can I share books across them or will they need to lend each other their kindle or buy book again? Unless I can’t do this on kindle but can on Kobo, then I may be swayed to Kobo!!

Log into Borrowbox through your laptop browser and it gives you the step by step instructions. You will need to download Adobe Digital Editions onto your laptop
(It's free) First time feels like a faf, but it's actually quick and easy once you are set up. You have to go into Adobe and remove the book once you have finished. My top top is to renew the book as soon as you download it, before you put it onto your Kobo, if you think you'll need longer than the standard 3 weeks. Hope that helps and happy reading!

if they use the same account then they can share the books across different devices

Support for the very first Paperwhite has ended. I was offered a 20% discount on a new Kindle, but my old one, about 12 years old can still be used to read my current library, but I can download new books. . If yours is 10 years old you are probably OK for now, but be prepared to have to replace in a couple of years. Fir a piece of tech to last 12 years is remarkable when you think a 12 year old phone would be on its last legs.

My entire family has kindles - my kids got theirs when they were maybe 8 or so and started reading longer books. My daughter (13) vastly prefers physical books so barely uses here but my 9 year old son reads almost always on the kindle. The kindle unlimited service has worked well for him so far. We replace them every 5 years maybe - my daughter’s is older (hand me down from Grandma) and annoyingly just expired so we will need to replace it if she wants a new one.

When I buy a kindle book for my daughter (or choose to share one of mine) I just go to:

1. Manage your content and devices
2. Select Books
3. Next to the book I want to share click on More Options
4. Manage family library
5. Add to whichever family Kindles I wish to share with.

It’s very straightforward. You have to set up the Amazon Family account first, with a maximum of 2 adults and 4 children.

Forgot to tag you @Mt563!

We all have kindles. I have a Kindle unlimited subscription for myself, and can use it for the whole family.

Another advantage is that if you have the same book on kindle and on audible, it is pretty good at syncing up between the two. So you can seamlessly switch between reading to them and playing the book in the car, which i like.

Kindle unlimited is great for kids, as it's full of e.g. 50 book long series of Minecraft based short novels, which are dross, but they love!

My 7yr old has a Kindle and the Amazon kids kindle subscription. He reads on the Kindle but still also reads 'proper' books. I'm all for anything that encourages reading and he loves it. Great for taking out and about, long journeys etc. it stood that you can use parental controls on and I can manage his through my own Kindle and the Amazon parents dashboard.

Thank you everyone for all your help!!! The family sharing is just what I need. 3 kindles ordered!! They’re going to be so surprised once they arrive. And hopefully solve a lot of issues we have around book storage. They’ve all come with a trial of Amazon kids/ kindle unlimited so we can see if we want to carry on with a ‘library feature’, or just stick to ones we’ve paid for. Summer holidays is perfect time to have this sort of subscription I think - hopefully will be very practical
Thanks!