Chapter 6 of 6
Keeping It Going
Protecting the habit matters more than protecting the schedule.
5 min read
Short and daily beats long and occasional
Ten minutes on six nights teaches more than an hour on a Sunday. The habit is the mechanism. Once reading is simply part of the evening, no motivation is required to start.
Let them choose, most of the time
Choice is what keeps a reader reading. Comics count. Rereading the same book for the eleventh time counts, and is doing real work: fluency is built on familiarity. Save your recommendations for one book in three.
When they refuse
Refusal usually means the reading has become an evaluation. Take the evaluation out: read to them instead for a few nights, no turns, no correction. Then offer a turn on one page. The goal is a child who does not brace when a book appears.
Signals it is working
- They finish a sentence you did not help with, and keep going.
- They mention a book without prompting.
- They ask what a word means.
- They argue with a character.
None of these are speed. All of them predict a reader.
Practice exercises
0 of 3 complete1.A child suddenly refuses to read. The most likely cause is…
2.Rereading the same book many times is…
3.Which of the four signals — reading on unaided, mentioning a book, asking word meanings, arguing with a character — have you seen this month? Give an example.