How many books did your kids end up reading?

[Anonymous]

^ I meant subtitled

[Anonymous]

our DD was not a great reader. she started graphic novels in 3rd on wings of fire (dragon books). that kicked her off to being a complete bookworm. she read at least 6 novels this summer, plus her required reading for school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:our DD was not a great reader. she started graphic novels in 3rd on wings of fire (dragon books). that kicked her off to being a complete bookworm. she read at least 6 novels this summer, plus her required reading for school.

That was key for my DS when he was in 3rd as well, graphic novels and the Warrior (cat) series books. He blew through those faster than I could get copies.

[Anonymous]

For my rising 1st grader, probably over 100 during the summer. For my rising 8th grader, only 3 books, but two of them are "animal farm" and "1984", and he wrote a substantial review for 1984 after doing some online research with the background and its impact. I'm not quite happy with the older one as he is never a self-motivated reader, but I'm glad he reads books carefully and did gain something out of reading.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:^ I meant subtitled

Yes! DC also didn't read any books per see but did watch a lot of subtitled anime which is certainly more like reading than listening to an audiobook.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Tons.

Lots of graphic novels, so we’re not talking great literature here, but if they’re asking to go to the library 2x/week, I’m good with that.

Pretty much this.

I'd estimate 80-100 graphic novels or long comic collections. Maybe more? I also read a few unillustrated novels to/with her. Rising 4th grader.

On some level, I'd prefer if she read more "regular" novels, but I think that desire isn't terribly rational, and I absolutely don't push it, ever, lest I make reading unillustrated books a chore-- which I don't think it is for her, per se. She's perfectly capable of reading them (mostly in school), enjoying them and gleaning deep meaning from them, and scores well into the 99th percentile on her MAP-R. I think she'll grow into reading more unillustrated work-- mainly because there are so many more great unillustrated works in print, and she won't want to miss them!-- but reading graphic novels is also not an immature way to read. It calls on slightly different skills, is all. And those skills are more and more useful as kids become, and everyone becomes, more visually literate.

I'm a writer, and briefly toyed with the idea of writing picture books. It's not an uncommon lament among people interested in writing them that the word count for picture books has gone WAY down in the past few decades. (Generally, they've remained about 32 pages, but with half the words they used to have.) This is often decried as the result of TV/videos, that kids don't have a long enough attention span, etc., etc. In fact, there is some truth to the influence of visual media like TV, but it's largely neutral to positive. Kids are more able to make sophisticated visual inferences about what is happening, so they simply don't need as many words. A picture is worth a thousand of them, right? A good picture, anyway. And decoding them is an important skill-- especially as (sophisticated!) pictures are increasingly the media we use to communicate, thanks to the Internet and so on.

I often think of one book in particular that illustrates why this shift isn't evidence of some obvious devolution. We have a ton of picture and easy reader books, mostly outgrown, almost all from the thrift store. We were sort of collecting Dr. Seuss and related books by that publisher at one point, and came across one called something like A Fish Out of Water. It's surely out of print, and for good reason, lol. It's... kind of entertaining, but loses its own plot, and doesn't tie up loose ends, among other things.

But what I really noticed was how redundant the text was and how thin the illustration-- while still entertaining, especially for the late 50s/early 60s (?) There were things like a whole page of (not a precise example)... "So I opened the basement door and went down the stairs," with a picture of a person going downstairs. Followed by "In the basement, I saw..." As a writer/editor, I could see how you'd now completely cut that first page, how little information it provided, how we expect audiences to be far more sophisticated now. You can just say you heard a noise in the basement, and jump to "in the basement, I saw...." Or even just show the person in the basement, and what they saw, with the words, "A giant FISH!" or whatever. You could even show a person upstairs, with a "BUMP! CRASH!" coming from a basement door, then, on the next page, they're downstairs-- showing huffing/puffing and "speed" lines, and stairs behind them-- with a shocked face and a giant fish. You hardly need words. And you definitely don't need to waste an entire page on their walking downstairs, and if you do, you don't need to also write "So I opened the basement door and went down the stairs."

(And yes, an easy reader can be helpfully redundant-- helping kids decode via context-- but let's just say this one was way over the top in terms of redundancy, by today's measures. Elephant and Piggie is more where it's at.)

Now, that's just one picture/easy reader book, and there's tons to be gained from unillustrated ones. But making visual inferences is a great skill, pictures with words support literacy, and many graphic novels have higher level vocabulary and more sophisticated storylines than unillustrated work. I'd as soon have my kid reading a book like "Meg, Jo, Beth and Amy" or "Pie in the Sky" (more of a hybrid graphic novel) or one of the Holm "Sunny" books as one of the unillustrated Sweet Valley Twins or Babysitters' Club novels I was sucking up by the dozens around the same age.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Tons.

Lots of graphic novels, so we’re not talking great literature here, but if they’re asking to go to the library 2x/week, I’m good with that.

Pretty much this.

I'd estimate 80-100 graphic novels or long comic collections. Maybe more? I also read a few unillustrated novels to/with her. Rising 4th grader.

On some level, I'd prefer if she read more "regular" novels, but I think that desire isn't terribly rational, and I absolutely don't push it, ever, lest I make reading unillustrated books a chore-- which I don't think it is for her, per se. She's perfectly capable of reading them (mostly in school), enjoying them and gleaning deep meaning from them, and scores well into the 99th percentile on her MAP-R. I think she'll grow into reading more unillustrated work-- mainly because there are so many more great unillustrated works in print, and she won't want to miss them!-- but reading graphic novels is also not an immature way to read. It calls on slightly different skills, is all. And those skills are more and more useful as kids become, and everyone becomes, more visually literate.

I'm a writer, and briefly toyed with the idea of writing picture books. It's not an uncommon lament among people interested in writing them that the word count for picture books has gone WAY down in the past few decades. (Generally, they've remained about 32 pages, but with half the words they used to have.) This is often decried as the result of TV/videos, that kids don't have a long enough attention span, etc., etc. In fact, there is some truth to the influence of visual media like TV, but it's largely neutral to positive. Kids are more able to make sophisticated visual inferences about what is happening, so they simply don't need as many words. A picture is worth a thousand of them, right? A good picture, anyway. And decoding them is an important skill-- especially as (sophisticated!) pictures are increasingly the media we use to communicate, thanks to the Internet and so on.

I often think of one book in particular that illustrates why this shift isn't evidence of some obvious devolution. We have a ton of picture and easy reader books, mostly outgrown, almost all from the thrift store. We were sort of collecting Dr. Seuss and related books by that publisher at one point, and came across one called something like A Fish Out of Water. It's surely out of print, and for good reason, lol. It's... kind of entertaining, but loses its own plot, and doesn't tie up loose ends, among other things.

But what I really noticed was how redundant the text was and how thin the illustration-- while still entertaining, especially for the late 50s/early 60s (?) There were things like a whole page of (not a precise example)... "So I opened the basement door and went down the stairs," with a picture of a person going downstairs. Followed by "In the basement, I saw..." As a writer/editor, I could see how you'd now completely cut that first page, how little information it provided, how we expect audiences to be far more sophisticated now. You can just say you heard a noise in the basement, and jump to "in the basement, I saw...." Or even just show the person in the basement, and what they saw, with the words, "A giant FISH!" or whatever. You could even show a person upstairs, with a "BUMP! CRASH!" coming from a basement door, then, on the next page, they're downstairs-- showing huffing/puffing and "speed" lines, and stairs behind them-- with a shocked face and a giant fish. You hardly need words. And you definitely don't need to waste an entire page on their walking downstairs, and if you do, you don't need to also write "So I opened the basement door and went down the stairs."

(And yes, an easy reader can be helpfully redundant-- helping kids decode via context-- but let's just say this one was way over the top in terms of redundancy, by today's measures. Elephant and Piggie is more where it's at.)

Now, that's just one picture/easy reader book, and there's tons to be gained from unillustrated ones. But making visual inferences is a great skill, pictures with words support literacy, and many graphic novels have higher level vocabulary and more sophisticated storylines than unillustrated work. I'd as soon have my kid reading a book like "Meg, Jo, Beth and Amy" or "Pie in the Sky" (more of a hybrid graphic novel) or one of the Holm "Sunny" books as one of the unillustrated Sweet Valley Twins or Babysitters' Club novels I was sucking up by the dozens around the same age.

Totally agree with every word, and thanks for providing such a lengthy while engaging illustration.
I'm wondering from professional point of view, how to help kids make good transition from learning and enjoy the literacy part of a book to better understanding the context, the underlying implications, the sarcasms. I feel this requires some adaptiveness too but in the meanwhile, I'm wondering if this is "teachable" or parents can help kids with? I'd rather reading an article with interesting storyline or some deep thoughts of the society with plain language than the other way around.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:0 .. my kid hates reading

LOL same. And yet he scores over 90% on MAP-R reading so not pushing it.

+1

But my kid constantly reads content online (including news and articles or blogs related to his hobbies and interests).

[Anonymous]

Around 30. He basically covered most of the suggested summer readings of various HSs. He is an avid reader and plows through reading lists throughout the year. He reads, he writes reviews online too - thanks to being enrolled in the CTY Language arts program several years ago. It gave him a structure in how to read for enjoyment, + identify the litrary devices used in the writing. Rising 8th graders.