want to switch DS's interest from pure fictional to science

[mom17]

My potter+percy jackson head just like fictional, though occasionally I force him to read classics( which he is fine with) + science fiction ( which he generally gives up after some times). I am looking for suggestion/strategy for me to cajole him to slowly towards other genre?

BertrandRussell, there is a version of the Bryson book aimed at (roughly) upper primary aged children.

DD really liked it around that age, IIRC we read it as a bedtime 'story' (but back then she had a phase of hating anything remotely stressful or tense which rules out almost all novels, hence the non-fiction!)

But OP, I do agree with the other comments, let them read what they like, and you'll find they diversify soon enough - particularly I found when dd went to secondary and there was a school library to browse in & librarian/english teacher recommending books. IME teachers' recommendations are listened to FAR more enthusiastically than parents' . . .

thanks for all the suggestion. As to why I want to switch his interest is mainly because he hardly heeds even when i shout for completing his h/w or preparing for any exam when he is engrossed in his books and 1 minute, 1 minute becomes 30-60 mins.

Yes, but DON'T!
If he enjoys reading and wants to, it comes out of his leisure time, and you don't dictate what he reads. Homework is to be done before leisure/screen time etc.
Does he see you read science books? That's the biggest encouragement in my experience.
Read science to him, one on one, and discuss it, but that's outside his personal leisure time.
But I would say- we have been trying for years to get our 11yo to retain anything she has read or we have told her about mythology. 5 Percy Jackson books later, she's a bloody expert!

Just wave more and more books that you think he might enjoy in front of him and gradually expand his horizons bit by bit. At age 10 I'd break him in gradually to popular science with the Horrible Science books - you can get the whole set for about 20 quid from Book People or Red House.

On fiction, I'd try him on Artemis Fowl, Terry Pratchett's Truckers/Diggers/Wings series, Jasper Fforde's LastDragon Slayer, Francesca Simon's Lost Gods and perhaps Frances Hardinge's Fly By Night. But your local library will have a huge choice - just pick tempting looking stuff up and say "what about this?"

Mom17 - that sounds completely normal.

As others have said just foster his enjoyment of books. Any books. Pushing him in the direction you favour may well just put him off completely.

Dh reads the Guinness Book of Records with dd at night sometimes. It's quite good in that it's short stints - a page or two per subject. It's just a surface thing really - showing them all that's going on in the world. Yes there are things like the world's biggest feet but also a lot of snippets of information on various subjects, set out in sections e.g. first use of DNA profiling, deepest open mine pit, first detection of gravitational waves from the Big Bang -all sorts of stuff and always something in there to grab their attention and increase their understanding a bit.

You have a 10 year old boy who reads willingly for goodness sake do not do anything to discourage him. Trying to get him to read things he doesn't enjoy will only take the joy out of reading potentially putting him off for life. This would do him a terrible disservice and do him huge amounts of harm in terms of intellectual development and educational attainment.

By all means encourage him to read but let him read what he enjoys. He will have plenty of time at school when he is forced to read things he doesn't enjoy during his leisure time let him chose even if you think it is trash or not advanced enough, he needs to continue to associate Reading with pleasure relaxation and escapism or he will stop doing it unless made to. There will be plenty of time for him to read high brow stuff in future if it interests him.

It's brilliant that he can be so engrossed in a book. These might interest him and have factual content:
George's secret key to the universe
The number devil

Wow what a strange OP. Most parents on mumsnet WANT their child to read for pleasure!!! I did and I love my children do.

Are you surprised your child might be developing different interests to you?

Really reading opens the mind to so much I'd be really pleased if I were you.

its not like I don't appreciate him reading books but I want him to read other genre also which he does occasionally, like he is reading secret now a days. i am ordering few books suggested here + ill try to read together.

You should order for yourself and read:

"How to Talk so Kids Will Listen and Listen so Kids Will Talk"
by Adele Faber

You seem rather anxious and maybe your DS senses that and is tuning you out.

I love that book!

In Robert A. Heinlein's books all the science and engineering is "true" and works. His juvenile novels might be good. Space Cadet, Space Family Stone, Have Spacesuit Will Travel, Podkayne of Mars, Tunnel in the Sky etc.

Please just let him read. Anything and everything.

DS(10) is a voracious reader. All I do is keep on topping up the bookshelves with things I hope he'll enjoy and take him to bookshops/libraries to choose more books. Sometimes I get it wrong but I will occasionally slip in something different, don't mention it and often he will pick it up. There is nothing worse than being told to read something and even as an adult I hate it.

When he's tired or has a lot on he goes back to old favourites and 'comfort reading' and that's fine too.

I think it is really odd to try to make a 10 yr old read things he hasn't yet developed an interest in, when he is happily reading already.

Do people make you listen to Country Music / Opera / heavy metal / jazz / teen pop / whatever music you aren't really in to ? How would you feel if they did ?

You have a 10 yr old who is enjoying reading for pleasure - why try to then dictate what is supposed to be pleasurable ?