Moving on from baby books at bedtime - for my sanity!

[drspouse]

I've been trying to move DS (5, in YR) up to slightly more challenging books for his bedtime story but (in a perfectly natural reaction to "hard" school reading books) he now only wants board/baby/"That's Not My" books to be read to him.

I have got him a whole load of easier chapter books and while he was happy with them for a bit he's now basically on "story strike" and won't have any thing that is harder to listen to/requires any concentration. Basically he asks for a That's Not My or a baby board book almost every day.

Which is fine but is driving me insane! Especially as I have a 3yo who a) wants everything he has and b) is also obsessed by these books.

We do have loads of books of all levels (better picture books etc) but I'm probably looking more for tactics to get him to choose something more interesting, than actual suggestions of books, but those would also be welcome.

In chapter books he's quite liked The Grunt and The Grouch and the Claude books but most of the others are a bit too wordy for him.

He's also rejecting quite a lot of his old favourites with quality words from Julia Donaldson and that ilk (though to give myself some light relief I think I will hunt those out for DD - honestly the 3,765th rendition of The Smartest Giant would be better than That's Not My Pony yet again).

Give him a choice between two or three pre chosen books if he kicks up a stink say calmly thats ok you can choose not to have a story at all if you prefer

My DD (2) loves Roald Dahl books and engages with them.

I started by showing her the Willy Wonka film, then we read the book, and she enjoyed that because she could already visualise from the film. Same afterwards, with Matilda. We then tried Fantastic Mr Fox, but read the book first and tried to put the film to it afterwards. Thank goodness, because the Mr Fox film was rubbish and the whole family wanted to give up after 20 minutes.

From there, we've just moved on to books she's never seen the film versions of and she's still enjoying them.

Roald Dahl is too wordy for him unfortunately - but we haven't watched Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - I suspect it might have a bit too much "mild peril" though we could give it a go. Many of them are really a bit scary or have inappropriate themes (e.g. family dying, wicked stepparents - he's adopted).

mymouth he'd just have no story and I'd rather he didn't do that every day! I suppose I could see how long he'd last for but he's a creature of habit so if he starts liking one type of story he carries on wanting it, and if he starts having no story then that becomes the new normal.

DD does this a bit. She’s a keen reader and will happily challenge herself and read some of her book to us, but she wants one of us to read to her something familiar and comforting at bedtime.

I’d be inclined to continue to let him choose (however boring it might be for you - sorry!), but perhaps find a different time of day to read something else to him – perhaps at breakfast time during the week (if mornings are not too frantic!) or straight after school. Also, if you get out the Julia Donaldson books for your younger child, maybe he will choose to listen in. Alternatively what about audio books for home or the car?

It won’t last – now DD is at the end of Y1 she’s happily listening to her father read a chapter or two of a Harry Potter or Narnia book (and taking the book away to get ‘ahead’ on her own, which frustrates Dad no end!).

Could he help read the "not my" book s to his sibling?
I'd go with it for now- it's nearly the end of the term he will be tired and just needing that reassurance and comfort. It's a regression thing but maybe he needs that to be indulged for a while in order to move on in a healthy manner.
I'm now remembering my dd had a "dummy at bedtime" phase around age 6 (end of first year at primary for her) despite never having had a dummy in her life previously!

Has he any particular interests? You might get away with a factual book (eg dinosaurs) with lots of pictures.

Maybe make up stories for a bit. I sometimes do that for a change - I ask dd for things she wants in the story (I limit it to three) and then just invent something around that. It's a always a bit random, but she loves it, I get to choose the length and it's a nice way to demonstrate having a go at being creative.

Could he help read the "not my" book s to his sibling?
Actually that's a great plan. They have some really easy words at his level.
He really is getting tired I think (aren't we all).
Interesting what you're saying about a dummy too. I wouldn't be surprised if we had some other regressions too.

Cinderella great idea, we can usually manage some creative story about him and his sister and an elephant or something.

Gin I might look out the Julia Donaldson audio books for the car - he used to really like them and DD is just coming up to the right age for them too. Also I've had enough of a break from them recently to be able to stand them again!

My DS has a tendency to get 'stuck' on one (type of) book too. It takes a long time for him to get bored of them! Never baby books though. And DD (3) has been having 'You Choose' as bedtime book every single day since before Christmas. Just some ideas:

Could you take him to the library, let him pick some books that you then read to him at bedtime? Would that help?

Can you let DD and DS choose the bedtime book alternately, or let DD choose first and work on her to choose something more interesting, maybe she's less 'set' in the habit than he is? And once he sees that she is choosing more 'grown up' books he might be swayed?

You could offer to re-read those chapter books that went well e.g. Claude.

We have some of our picture books in audio-versions. What sometimes worked for us was to have the audio-book running after lights-out. So DS got his safe, familiar story right at the end of the day - often the same one for half a year or so. But it wasn't me reading him the same story every day. We still had bedtime books (before lights-out obviously) and were able to choose more widely, perhaps because he always knew that the safe, familiar story would follow afterwards.

You could introduce a new 'rule' (at a quiet time during the day, so he has some warning) that from now on he will get to choose one book and you will get to choose one book.

What is it about the baby board books? The 'That's not my ...' books have no 'story' - you could try more grown-up / interesting story-less books e.g. 'You Choose' (great for having conversations/interaction), or simple non-fiction books.
Or is it the 'board' that makes it un-threatening and safe? There are some 'regular' picture books that have also been published as board books, e.g. many of the Julia Donaldson/Axel Scheffler books. Try that maybe? If you don't want to buy a book in board version that you already own, maybe you can find them at the library.
Is it the predictability? Maybe determine which of the other books you have (and have read together already) are most predictable, and begin by suggesting those?

Could you try reading something more challenging first, just a chapter or so and read his favourite book after that? Hopefully if he engages with the more challenging books eventually he will just want those. Getting him to read to younger siblings is also a good idea. My dd loves her Elmer board book and will bash it when I close it at the end so that I read it again and again and again. I might resort to hiding it!

@JigsawBat Reading Matilda to a 2 year-old?! Surely I have misunderstood. Currently reading it to my nearly 5 year old and there are so many things she doesn't understand, not just vocabulary but whole concepts: poverty, arithmetic, suicide!

Please do let me know, I'm fascinated.

OP The Gruffalo is a great transition book as it rhymes. From there, other Julia Donaldsons will be popular.

Both my dc loved the Hairy McLary books at that age. Probably because I had to do lots of dog and/or cat noises throughout the story. Maybe try one of those and see if he likes the ritual humiliation of mummy for a nice change at bedtime?

He used to love his Julia Donaldsons but has refused even those recently too mayrat

silky he knows they aren't easy/baby books though and just says "NOT THAT" and runs away and hides/goes under the covers. Basically anything with more than about 25% words/pictures and more or less anything with non-board pages.

Dubious we do have some of those, if he's not in too much of a rut he might consent to one of those.

Sounds like regression, for sure. Mine went through this too and we made a deal where each night we'd read 3 books, two that she chose and one that I chose.

I would read mine first and if she listened nicely, I would read the others to her. I repeated 3 or 4 books for "my" choice until she was familiar with those and eventually started requesting those ones too.

She is still very reluctant to let her toddler sister have any of her "old" books so we have to tell her we are borrowing them, even though she hasn't read them in years.

*@JigsawBat Reading Matilda to a 2 year-old?! Surely I have misunderstood. Currently reading it to my nearly 5 year old and there are so many things she doesn't understand, not just vocabulary but whole concepts: poverty, arithmetic, suicide!

Please do let me know, I'm fascinated.*

No misunderstanding. Obviously there will be a lot of it that will go right over her head, but I try to explain things according to what's appropriate to her personal understanding, and some bits we completely gloss over and she doesn't question or notice. She certainly hasn't asked about suicide, or even about Magnus' death. She understands 'death' as much as a two year old can, so the word didn't need an explanation. She knows it means that someone's gone. That was all that needed to be relevant.

Miss Honey's poverty, I explained to her in that some people don't have as much money as others. She knows that DH and I work to earn money to provide our home, food and all of the fun things we do together, and I explained that some people don't have as much money for any number of reasons, and where we can buy lovely meals there are some people that can just afford bread and butter (margarine).

There are many, many bits that she won't understand, of course, but we do 1-2 chapters a night when we read a Dahl book and I will stop to explain things a bit when I think it's necessary and that I can explain them at her level. When it's not necessary to explain, or in the other direction when she simply doesn't need to comprehend ideas of death and suicide in detail just yet, we simply keep reading. Trunchbull as a character, and Bogtrotter's cake eating, were the bits that most captured her imagination.

Is there a way of taking it in turns, DC1/DC2/Mum. And when it is your turn gradually up the difficulty level?
I feel your pain because my youngest liked the same books over and over and over ...
Or get something on cd for the car eg woof/ Sophie book/Enid blyton etc and gradually work through it ... training him in anticipation and the excitement of following a story.
Does he watch films?
He is v young still and is using the baby books for comfort after the long stressful day of school.... he doesn't yet realise the magic of proper stories or that by lying there and listening it will be easy for him to follow.
School hols coming up so maybe you should wait until then?

mary that's almost certainly the answer! I will try one of mine and one of his (little sister has a story separately and has been choosing more ambitious ones than him!)

Jigsaw I take my hat off to you but my 5yo wouldn't sit through one chapter of BFG or Charlie and the Chocolate Factory at a sitting and we certainly won't be trying James and the Giant Peach or Matilda yet.

He does watch films but there aren't that many tie-ins between simple readable books and watchable films (and he's even started refusing the Julia Donaldson adaptations!). Suggestions v welcome though!

Good idea to have more reading in school holidays. We have little time for anything in the morning or after school though there's always weekends, but we won't have to rush in the holidays (he's going to holiday club but my work is generally OK with a slightly late start and work through lunch).

In terms of actual books he might like, I just started reading the early reader versions of Horrid Henry to my 6 year old. She finds them hilarious.

Could you bear with the baby books for a bit? It'll be school holidays soon, so maybe in the summer when there's no school reading, he'll be happier to try something more challenging.

If he's doing his school reading then what is the big deal? Just read to him what he wants.

Film/book: One snowy night, Nick Butterworth. The Nick Butterworth picture books about Percy the Parkkeeper would be nice to read anyway, if you haven't done them yet.

Perhaps 'Peterson and Findus'?

After having read 'Paddington' to DS every night for several months, and him then listening to the audiobook every night for several more months, I took him to see the new Paddington film in the cinema. (I think he was 4 and a half or so, it seems I misjudged the situation...)
We never touched that book again!

If he's doing his school reading then what is the big deal?

School books are a yawn a minute and aren't teaching him anything about narrative/plot/giving a love of reading/books/stories. At 5, his ability to appreciate stories is going to be streets ahead of his ability to read them.

And the baby books aren't exactly enhancing that side of things either.
I do think it's a rut/regression (which is fine) rather than what he would really enjoy to listen to though so I would rather he find something he actually enjoys.

brilliotic thanks for those - he used to love his Paddington for Younger Readers but I do agree about the film!

I think the idea of you choose one and he chooses one and you read both (starting with the one you choose) is a good idea, I did that with DD when she went through a similar phase.

Right now I'm reading with her (she's 6) books from this collection www.thebookpeople.co.uk/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/qs_product_tbp?productId=424276 which has picked up her interest in slightly longer stories but doesn't require sustaining the interest and concentration over a longer time period like chapter books do. Also got her the Ladybird audio book collection which she listens to after lights out and that helped encourage her interest in books beyond baby board books etc.

My native country don't do bed time stories. Still, both myself and my sister turned out to be a big book lover, since we had lots of books at home and saw parents reading all the time.

My ds refused to be read at bedtime around 2, he preferred to read to himself/pretend to read to himself at bed time. At bed time, I read my book, and he read his.(Or pretended to read.)
Still , he enjoyed me reading to him stories during the day, especially the funny ones. More OTT the expression, the better, and realised he was reading exactly like I did one day.

So, if you want him to listen to more complex story, try during the day when he is less tired and receptive, maybe? If you just want him to teach him narrative/love of reading by listening to you read, any book is good. And you just have to tolerate a bit longer.

School books are a yawn a minute and aren't teaching him anything about narrative/plot/giving a love of reading/books/stories. At 5, his ability to appreciate stories is going to be streets ahead of his ability to read them

Yes but a love of reading comes from him choosing and making his own decisions.

Both of mine are avid readers and we have plenty of books. Sometimes they like younger books, sometimes not.

I subscribed to the Reading Chest to get a range of non fiction for ds to read in reception.

13 story tree house series - chapters but lots of pictures (line drawings).

My youngest lived them at 5 but older kids liked listening too - very silly, light, but might be a good stepping stone.

Also read stuff like the Beano to him - also loads of pictures, my6 yo loves them and did at 5.

Think laterally, it doesn't have to be classics all the time.