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Atkinson’s Tips to
Get Your Kids Reading

While working for a company that promotes education and being a hands-on dad, Glen Atkinson has learned a few things on how to incorporate reading into a child’s routine. Here are some of his tips:

1. Read everyday. Reading daily helps your child to get used to the activity. It becomes part of a routine that helps create a sense of stability for the child and it also doubles up as a quality bonding time for you and your kid.

2. Don’t make it ‘work.’ You have to make it fun. It has to be a time that you share and enjoy. It only has to be 15 minutes, it doesn’t have to be an hour.

3. Choose fun books. Get to know your child’s preference and choose a book that will be fun for him or her to read. Make sure that the book is age-appropriate. If a child counts five or more unfamiliar words in a book, it’s above the child’s comprehension, said Atkinson. A good rule of thumb is to choose books that have between only two to four unfamiliar words.

4. Be patient. Sometimes, it takes a while for children to learn how to recognize words and even to sound them out. So, even if it may take your child a longer time to learn a certain word’s pronunciation, remember to always be patient and supportive.

POSTED: Oct. 9, 2008

Reading creates
successful adults

by Lailani Mendoza

If you can read this article, consider yourself lucky. According to United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), adults who are literate are healthier than their counterparts who can neither read nor write. Research also supports that children’s ability to read affects their success in school and even later in life.

“It’s a key to personal development and economic opportunity, and a major factor in Canadians’ ability to participate as full and active citizens in all areas of society. For these reasons, literacy is everyone’s business,” reported the Human Resources and Social Development Canada website.

It’s so important that UNESCO designated Sept. 8 as International Literacy Day to remind people to make and support efforts towards literacy.

Leap Frog Canada, a company that specializes in products that facilitate learning, started a program to promote literacy called the One Million Reading Hours Program. The program encourages parents and schools to spend 15 minutes of reading a day with children for 30 days to prevent learning loss during the summer and ignite a love of reading among kids. The company has surpassed its goal, gaining 1.2 million reading hours from children across Canada.

The program started early June 2008 when the company sent participation kits to 2,000 schools across Canada which contained a pledge tracker chart that measured how many days the kids have spent reading alongside a growth chart that measures their height, said Glen Atkinson, Leap Frog Canada’s marketing director.

“The great thing about reading is that there’s so much out there. There’s so much to explore, to use your imagination and learn.”

Atkinson’s seven-year-old daughter, whose reading tastes range from Dora the Explorer to any of the Robert Munsch classics, was a willing participant of the program. “She was lucky enough to have me make her participate all summer,” said Atkinson. “And her class,” he added, laughing.

All the time spent reading with his child is evident on her quick learning progress, said Atkinson. “Early recognition of learning the ABCs, putting together small words to building sentences and understanding. She can read labels on packaging and billboard advertising. It took the whole development process that much more expedited because of (reading).” An added bonus is that while she’s improving her reading skills, she’s also learning facts from the topic of the book itself, he said.

“We stress the importance of early reading in children, knowing that it’s an early predictor of that child’s success,” he said. “So many people really don’t take that opportunity. As a father, I spend probably between 15 minutes to half an hour every night reading. I read a book, my wife reads a book, and then my daughter reads a book. We’ve been doing that for a very long time. It’s definitely an important step.”