This was my experience too with my first two kids. First one listened for 49 minutes at 15 months, second one had. I interest at that age! It worried me too. I kept reading to him while he nursed, through the crib when I put him down, in the car seat before we left, etc and by 18 months the switch flipped and he could sit just as long as his sister for books.

Anonymous wrote:Continue to sit and read aloud while she explores other things.

THIS. You read while your child explores around you in the room. That is developmentally age appropriate for a 15-month-old. Sitting still in your lap for 30 minutes to read a book is not appropriate at all. OP, I say this kindly like a lot of other posters, but your older being able to sit still at a young age while you read them a book is not the norm. Quite honestly, I think you need a parenting book so that you can have a better gauge on what is within the range of normal behavior for toddlers.

I have never convinced my 18 month old to listen to an entire board book, but books are her favorite thing. She is just more interested in flipping pages, lifting flaps, finding/naming objects, counting, etc. Reading is exhausting for me and not the quiet activity I was looking forward to. But my kid loves books and does seem to pick up information from the My First Words type books. Some day she will be mature enough to listen to the narrative and some more complex language, but for now I'm following her lead.

She’s a baby! Relax.

I get the frustration of trying to read to a wiggly kid, but agree with all PPs that you just need to roll with it.

Our 3.5 year old used to love sitting in our laps while we read books. But at about 2.5, she decided she wanted to be more active during reading time. She likes to "act out" the books, often imitating the positions of characters in the pictures or grabbing props from around her room. She loves intractive books (her favorite is "press here"). Also, now that she is learning letters and basic phonics, she likes to interrupt and ask about different words and letters and discuss them.

It makes for an exhausting, highly variable, reading experience. We used to be able to sit and cruise through 10-11 books with her. She'd sit and read with us for 30-40 minutes. Now we have to tag out and take turns because it's a lot and after 15 minutes, we need a break. But she still loves books and is engaging with them and getting what she's supposed to out of it. It's just not the cozy one-on-one time it once was. We now do that in other ways, when singing to her or talking to her at bedtime.

You've got to parent your kid wherever they are at. There are some things you can force the issue on for their own good (for us, it's brushing teeth, getting dressed, and going outside). But you have to pick and choose. I would not choose to fight your child over this.

I actually think you’re doing the wrong thing with your older one. Chapter books at 3.5yo, when there are so many lovely picture books around? Blech. You’re going to be one of the ones complaining that public school can’t accommodate your 4th-grade-reading-level kindergartner!

Anonymous wrote:this has to be troll bait.

NP. I actually really related to this post. DS1 was listening in 3, 30-minute chunks by 8 months. I know his age, because of a sweet Mother’s Day video we took, where he was listening to a book. DS2 can get through three pages at 20 months. It really ate me up at first, but after asking around, I realized that DS1 was outside the norm. No need to dismiss OP as a troll, just because you can’t relate.

I do have more success reading during snack time, OP.

OP here - thanks everyone. I guess I need to chill

this has to be troll bait.

I can't believe that this thread is coming from a second time parent LOL.

OP, why are you so "desperate" to get her to sit still and listen to you read a book for 30 minutes? This is bizarre to me. She's a toddler, she wants to explore. It's great that she likes to flip through books. Let her do that. I have a hard time wrapping my head around the fact that you wrestle her to sit still and read a book. You need to chill.

We had to force it. We sat with him and read a book (a song book was best, like a "wheels on the bus" book, one with push buttons or a lift the flap book) every night. Just one. I actually had to force my older child too.

By 20 months he was laying in my bed with my 4 year old and listening to us read. We read in my bed with sippy cups of milk (then brush teeth).

Anonymous wrote:Your child is 15 months old and you’ve been trying your fifth “trick” to get her to sit and listen for 6 months. That means you were already trying to get her to sit and listen at 9 months. Your expectations are not realistic for every child. I have a dd who would lay in her crib, examining her fabric books as though she was reading them, when she was just 6 months old. I have another dd with ADHD who didn’t do that. She was always highly distractable. I just exposed her to lots of language and she paid attention when she was interested. She developed a very rich vocabulary, became a high level reader, and is gifted in verbal reasoning, but she still fidgets, likes to move around, and only listens when she’s interested. She has proven time and time again that you can’t tell whether she’s listening by watching her, because she can appear to be in her own little world when she’s actually hanging on your every word.

I’m not saying your dd has ADHD. What I’m trying to convey is that some kids just aren’t going to sit still and listen politely, but they’re still benefiting from being read to.

This jumped out at me, too. OP really needs to work on adjusting her expectations -- your second is not the same person as your first.

Continue to sit and read aloud while she explores other things.

Do interactive books, like Dinosaur Dance. I read it to my son and he does the "dance".