The love of reading can help kids succeed in so many areas of their lives. Good reading skills are essential for success in school and a future career but it can also help kids develop a love of learning and open the doors to many new hobbies and experiences. I love to read but I remember as a child really struggling with the task of learning to read. If you are the parent of a reluctant reader, these tools may help you both enjoy the process of learning to read more and help your child to discover what a real joy books can be.

Mark My Time Bookmark

My oldest child loves to read but it took a while to get there. He’s extremely task oriented – I can’t take the kid to the zoo without him focusing mainly on the map – so I looked for tools that would make him feel like he had completed something when he was first starting to read books for fun. The Mark My Time digital bookmark is a great tool for goal oriented reluctant readers because it helps them to set a concrete reading goal. This simple tool is a plastic bookmark with a timer attached to the top – my kids love anything digital so they were sold on it from the beginning. It has simple button controls that allow you to either count up or count down to your goal. My 6 year old has used it for the past several months as part of his homeschool curriculum to help keep track of how many minutes he is reading each day. We’ve set a goal for him to read something he enjoys for at least 20 minutes a day. My son likes to let the timer count up to 20 minutes because often times he will get into his book and not want to stop when he hits his reading goal. Mark My Time Bookmark will also show the current time and count down from a goal, say if you wanted to set a goal of reading for 60 minutes a week and the timer will go off when you have reached that goal.

Preschool Prep : Meet the Sight Words

One of the most difficult things about learning to read for many kids can be the frustration from comes from words that simply cannot be sounded out. I’m thrilled that more schools are going back to phonics based programs again but there are still many words that just don’t follow the rules – and they show up in books and other printed material a lot! Kids that are able to master basic sight words have a huge advantage and can really start to enjoy the process of reading.

The Preschool Prep DVD series may have the word preschool in its name but I think it’s perfect for any child that is struggling learning to read basic sight words. The DVD is colorful and attracts the attention of younger children but my 6 year old sat and watched it without complaining with his younger brothers. There’s a real benefit for kids to practice reading things that may be a bit easy for them sometimes too because it gives them the confidence they need to learn the harder stuff. The DVD uses a really visually based learning system that brings the sight words to life by having the letters of the word participate in an action that parallels the meaning of the word. This method is a great memorization tool and can really help visual learners.

LeapFrog Tag

Part of the joy of learning to read is kids can explore literature that they want to read as an independent activity. When kids struggle with reading comprehension or are slow readers, they can quickly learn to dislike the act of reading. The LeapFrog Tag system allows early and struggling readers to enjoy the books that they want to read at whatever level they are at. The Tag will either read the entire book to the child, read one page at a time, or read individual words that the child is struggling with so they don’t slow down their pace and get out of the rhythm of the story. We bought my oldest son a LeapFrog Tag when they first came out and it’s been fun to me to see his progression. In the beginning, he knew his letters but couldn’t really read, so he let the Tag read the story to him. He used to enjoy “reading” each book and would often have the Tag read only one word at a time so he felt like he was reading the book on his own. We were shocked at how quickly my son transitioned from having the Tag read the book, to reading a few words on  his own and letting the Tag to the rest, to only needing help with a few words in the book. Today he still enjoys his Tag books, but he doesn’t need the help from the Tag pen at all. His younger siblings are now enjoying their own Tag and Tag Jr. and learning to love reading as much as their older brother does.

Rebus Stories

Even if you haven’t heard of rebus stories before, you very likely already know what they are. Rebus stories substitute a picture for some of the words in a story so kids can participate in the reading process from a very early age or simplify the reading process if they are struggling. Highlights magazine is well known for their rebus stories but there are many other children’s rebus books on the market. Rebus stories do an important thing for reluctant readers – they make reading fun again and take the focus off sounding out every word perfectly. Reading should be fun and learning to read should be a fun process for kids and not a source of stress.