Years of teaching, particularly English, often involved great conversations with parents about our love of literature or the best books to read at the moment. Sadly, for some children their heart would sink as they were invited to choose a book from the library and spend five minutes in silence. I am a self-confessed voracious reader who would quite happily sink into a hammock for a day with a good book. Admittedly, I spent the first days in Lockdown 1.0 going through the list of Carnegie Medal winners pre-1976, comfort reading at its height! Reading Lucy Mangan’s ‘Bookworm’ gave me an excuse to relive old favourites from Shirley Hughes to Enid Blyton and on to Willard Price.
You probably have not left a parent’s evening without a teacher mentioning the importance of reading. So why is there this insistence on getting children reading? Encouraging them to pick up a book and sail away to a foreign land is the mission. What do they find when they get there? How does it make them feel? What are they thinking?
Our message at Meta Prep is about becoming an independent thinker and using your experiences and current knowledge to address new situations; a book is a great way to start.
Good to read
Reading allows children to discover new worlds, meet new people and learn about the past. It develops empathy and critical thinking. At a time when many children are deprived of social contact, a book is a great way to help them connect with ‘others’ and help them prepare for the return to the classroom.
One of my favourite bumper stickers is ‘there is no app to replace your lap, read to your child.’ I would reiterate that there is no magic age to stop reading with and to your child. A parent reading to their child can unlock complicated prose that opens a previously closed door. As little as 10 mins a day can make all the difference.
Reading increases vocabulary, improves spelling and can help with punctuation! It is an essential part of life and opens deeper learning in the classroom. The best part is it develops the ability to reflect, which is often the weakest part of the learning process. As metacognitive learners, being able to reflect on their learning is key.
Barriers
For many children, particularly boys as they pass into secondary school, reading can seem to be seen as some kind of secret code understood only by teachers and women. Feeling alienated is so easy and the quickest way to turn a child away from reading. If they think that everyone is getting meaning from a book and to them it just stinks, it feeds into their insecurities and they will run away screaming from the problem.
We need to demystify the whole process and make it engaging and enthusing. It should not always be about the need to increase vocabulary etc, but about finding the sweet spot: where interest meets confidence. If you have a child that is passionate about football or drama, then find a book or non-fiction title within their reading range that will entice them to read.
Start the book with them, make it a joint adventure of discovery, and remember that your tastes are not their tastes. It could be comics, graphic novels, audiobooks, the sports pages or magazines; fluency and challenge can come later.
Reading age
Many schools use a variety of assessments to judge the reading age of a child. A reading age refers to a child’s ability in relation to the average age of comparable ability. Many textbooks require a certain level of reading ability for children to be able to read and understand them. The reading age goes up as fluency increases and that will be as a result of practice. Daily reading with you and in school has immense power to lift their literacy skills opening up a host of knowledge, understanding, interests and enjoyment. At Meta Prep, preparing children for the 11+ is a challenge as every question uses complex and nuanced language; it requires impressive comprehension skills before they even tackle the answer.
We want children to read for pleasure and like everything in life, we need to sprinkle the trail with breadcrumbs to show them the way.
Ideas to get going:
- Shadowing – take part and become a judge: The Carnegie and Kate Greenaway Medals
- Meta Prep’s 100 book challenge – we have created a list of books that cross a range of abilities and genres to help children read widely with confidence. Download and tick them off.
- Book buffet – grab 4 different styles of books, set a timer and tell them they should read the first book until they hear the timer go off, after 8 mins. When the timer goes off, they must quickly move to another place in the room and begin reading the next book. At the end you can discuss what / why / how and use this to create a reading map.
- Book club – The Book Dragon Club offers a beautifully packed ‘book box membership’ that arrives each month to engage even the most reluctant reader and help them explore a diverse range of authors and genres.
Preparation at Meta Prep is geared towards the 11+ exam, but goes beyond test-taking skills to create reflective, critical and creative learners who are prepared and ready to thrive beyond the school gates.