Many children learn how to read in kindergarten, even before kindergarten, but when she was five Emma was still struggling to put sounds to letters and stringing them together.
Was I a bad parent because my daughter wasn’t reading by the age of three? Or maybe she wasn’t going to be very smart?
It always bothered me when I heard other parents crowing about what great readers their kids were. I felt like a failure.
We’d been reading to her since she was a tiny baby. Mark and I both love books. There was reading material all over the house – all the time! Hadn’t we been doing everything right?
I’m here to tell you that if your kid isn’t reading in kindergarten, don’t worry. I needn’t have worried so much. Both girls are crazy about books and will read at every opportunity.
I think with Emma, the reading happened as a result of two things:
- 1) The introduction of the comic book
It’s all about finding irresistible reading material. I never read comics growing up, but somehow came to possess a stack of old Richie Rich comics. Emma LOVED looking at them. We were camping one summer and it was raining. We took a trip to the local camp store and picked up some secondhand Archie comics for her to look at. She wanted to read them so badly that she forced herself to plow though and understand them. - 2) “Special” treatment at bedtime
Emma and Sarah are only 23 months apart. When they were very small we tried having separate bedtimes but Sarah would have none of it. (She’s always considered herself to be Emma’s equal!) So we made Emma a secret deal. The girls would go to bed at the same time but Emma was allowed to stay up later – as long as she was reading in bed.
I think these two things solidified Emma’s love for reading. She’s been non-stop ever since. She loves stories with magic and mystery. We were at Chapters yesterday and we bought a graphic novel that was recommended to me called Amulet. (I read it yesterday and LOVED everything about it.) But it’s not just about comics anymore. She’s also really interested in historical fiction (!) and has read several books from the Canadian and American girls series.
I’m very glad we now have two extra readers in the house. It does my heart good when we all snuggle on the couch with our books.
