Is reading really as beneficial as everyone says?

[Emilyisherenow]

Ds is 9, year 5.

He finds English difficult and has been a bit behind throughout primary school.

I'm reading chapter books with him for 10 minutes to half an hour. I'm trying to go for some of the classic, more well written books. We do a page each.

He doesn't really enjoy reading but he accepts that it's important and does seem to enjoy the time together.

Will it definitely be helping and making a difference?

Audio books are great- they get more story for less effort, and still benefit from all the language learning.

My reluctant reader started to fly on books I’d never have given him. Darren Shan I think was the author- young horror. A book that’s easy to read and has a compelling plot is a better bet than a good quality book at this stage, I feel.

You want the page turning element, the equivalent of a soap opera. They get enough practice for it to become less daunting.

My DD is 8 and loved the treehouse books- she read them independently and begged for the next one!

Reading is important but I think it's as important to ask questions to check they understand why they are reading, for example, my DD read something earlier that said "in the dead of night" so we had a brief chat about what that meant, why the author didn't just write "late at night" or "at 1am". To that end, it doesn't matter what they are reading as long as it's for pleasure.

This. Take him to the library and let him have free rein to choose what looks interesting to him whether that is non-fiction or comic books.

I was going to say exactly this. My now 14 year old only read comics until about 12. Then he went reading mad and is reading everything he can get his hands on- currently he has both Mary Shelly's Frankenstein and John Grisham's The Pelican Brief on the go.

Also- hobby magazines- whatever he likes. Football, gaming etc.

Does he have a lot of screen time? The overstimulation of screens can make the slow pace of reading really dull by comparison.

My mum used to buy The Sun for my Dnephew. He would read the football pages out to her over breakfast. He was less than the target age for vocab (11-13) and he wanted to do it! Any reading is good.

I've heard good things about the treehouse books so will look into those as well as other suggestions. Goosebumps look good too although he does get a bit scared.

Honestly totally get what everyone's saying about old fashioned dreary books but please believe me I've tried so much.

Two boys and they had all the football books, Minecraft, marvel, comics. Pretty much anything they've seen at the library, book fair.

Often they'd choose something and it would end up just gathering dust.

Luckily ds1 gets on well anyway.

Dh won't read anything either. Not even the back of a packet. I honestly think some people just do not like reading.

But I'm determined to push on with ds2 luckily he enjoys sitting with me.

Audible is also excellent for kids this age (or any audiobook service) as this allows them to access the literature and improve their vocab, grammar etc without the faff of sitting down with a book. Not instead of reading but in addition. Lots of fantastic recordings of children’s books.

I’m a bit torn on this.

In my experience the type of children who love to read are very good at English anyway. The enjoyment of reading follows from that rather than reading being the reason they are good at English.

We know some people struggle with reading. If that’s you then you’re never going to enjoy it. I find reading really easy and the words just pour into my brain with no effort at all. My DH is functional enough but reading requires concentration and effort. I’ve never known him read anything for pleasure, even a magazine. He works in IT. Reading anything longer than a Slack message is not part of his job at all.

my Dd was like this - great at reading but not really interested. She did love to hear me read to her, so I did that until end of y6.

Then I stumbled on Podkin One-Ear series which she absolutely loved; and after that I bought her Varjak Paw managed to get her hooked on the Warrior Cats books - I bought a handful which kept her busy for a while.

And then she also enjoyed “choose your own adventure” style books; and later on escape room books and hobby-related books were enjoyed.

She reads very little now she is 14 but she does enjoy Stephen King. She is absolutely smashing her way through her English lessons so there are ways to achieve success without being an avid reader.

But I can’t help but dream about sharing novels that I love with her.

My son loves reading which I’m really grateful for as he seems to hate sleeping🤦🏼‍♀️ He reads the Dogman series and Bunny Vs Monkey books they are more comic style. There is also a Dogman movie coming out in Feb.
He also watches Netflix with the subtitles on sometimes which I do find a bit odd but says he enjoys reading them. Which might be worth a try as a way of a more secondary source.

Yes it's so important for them to be able to read and absorb and follow a storyline.

Have you tried the Rangers Apprentice series. That was written specifically for reluctant readers. It was really good, I remember reading it even though it was more boyish than I usually liked.

There's a one off book called Roscoes Leap that I loved at his age. Stuck with me into my 30s until I eventually found it and read it again. I remembered the scenes from it but not the name, it's very imagery provoking. Searched for that for years.

What about graphic novels? Would he like those better? Bit more going on visually.

Or what about something a little older? Is he just finding it boring maybe if he is very fluent? Maybe its too easy for him and not engaging enough. Harry Potter? His Dark Materials? The Named trilogy? The Secret Hour series by Scott Westerfield.

My son didn't enjoy reading and was below average in primary school, BUT he loved stories and films and was very bright and articulate when discussing them.
We persevered with letting him read whatever HE wanted and kept reading harder stuff to him together.

He was later diagnosed with dyslexia. He's now an avid reader, but particularly likes reading alongside audiobooks.

Yes reading/being read to is very important for all the reasons mentioned, but with a really reluctant reader you need an in by any means.
Can I suggest some crap books that little boys love? I’m reading the 13 Storey Treehouse books with my little boy, and they are utterly ridiculous, but also funny and engaging for children. Despite being ridiculous the vocabulary is good/extending, there’s history references, random bits of poetry… the learning stuff is all there even in books that as a reader of good literature I could sniff at, but if it teaches my little boy that books are worth spending time on it’s worth it. The Grimwood books are also good for the same reason, or Peanut Jones? Go for fun.

@CamelsForChristmas
Just wanted to say wow that your son is reading Frankenstein, I think I have bounced off that book maybe 5 times. I do keep trying but I just can't!
I work in a secondary school library and I highly recommend the Cherub series, its the only thing I've ever found that non readers get into. OP your son is a touch young though for Cherub the first book stars a protagonist in year 7. He could try manga. And yes reading is literally the difference between good grades and bad at GCSE.

Dog man and Cat Kid!

The Investi-gators

Did they have books since baby/toddler age?
Peepo, Each Peach, Hug, Dear Zoo - that kind of thing?
Then The Gruffalo, Tiddler etc as they reached pre-school?

IME that's when children develop their love of books - if it starts young it stays

Try Fighting Fantasy books. They're "choose your own adventure" type.
Short paragraphs then turn to the page depending on the choice you made or what the dice say (though my dc didn't bother with dice and assumed they won every battle)
All my dcs friends got into them too.

Readers are Leaders

Factual magazines, about whatever he's interested in?

The Big Nate books are hilarious, basically comics, but good vocabulary. They are cheap 2nd hand on Ebay and there's loads of them.
Perfect for his age.

I read an interview with The Diary of a Wimpy Kid author, Jeff Kenny, who said that it’s so important for kids to read regularly, but it doesn’t matter what they read. It could be anything. Comics, magazines, newspapers, anything. Just so long as they read.

I’d give up on the chapter books if he’s not enjoying them. Have you tried The Week Junior? When my DS was your DS’s age he used to love flicking through that and reading the articles.

You need to stop with the snobbish desire to read 'proper' books that are 'well-written' and accept that well written often means very wordy, with dense chunks of description that children actually find quite BORING in this day and age.
Lots of boys this age enjoy books that are silly/funny, go and get some david baddiel books, mr gum, that sort of stuff.
Stig of the Dump is very dated and boring!

Tom Gates hugely popular also at this age. You just need to keep the reading at this age even if it's low brow

I also second the Tree House books, Dogman full series and then start him off on books that you might think are too young but can catch him up with confidence.