Summer Reading

Education Week recently brought up the topic of summer reading and how summer reading is different for kids and for teachers. 

The article stresses the importance of making sure that books are readily available for children, particularly in places where they get bored such as the car (probably not good advice if your child gets carsick though!). It also warns against rewarding children for reading because that gives them the implicit message that reading is not a fun and desirable activity. 

Baby Sneaker (who I think I officially cannot call "baby" anymore and who will heretofore be referred to as "Little Sneaker" so that her baby sister can be "Baby Sneaker") is participating in the summer reading program through the library. She LOVES to read so we signed her up and she's been earning stickers on her game board. 

 We add one sticker for every 15 minutes we read. We always read at least two stories at bedtime and she requests stories throughout the day as we play and often before her nap as well. We definitely read more than 15 minutes per day, so she has been accumulating stickers like a rockstar. But, that's not what drives her to want to read and hear stories. She did earn two small prizes at the library for reaching certain levels, but if I put away the game board and she never got another prize, it wouldn't matter. 

We just LOVE to read in our house. 

I like how the article emphasizes that summer reading for kids/students should be enjoyable and they should read books or other print sources that interest them. Reading for pleasure is different than reading at school and reading for pleasure is important. The International Reading Association just released a position statement on the importance of leisure reading.

The EdWeek article also discusses summer reading for teachers. 

"Joshua Block reflects on the critical importance of summer reading for educators—or at least for him: In order to challenge the inevitable feelings of burnout and mechanization that I feel in June, I use summer to immerse myself in books and open myself to unplanned discoveries, ideas, and inspiration for the next school year. I aim to keep the list of books broad and include many different titles. My hope is to challenge and nurture myself in ways that relate directly to my teaching practice and in ways that nurture my identity outside of teaching."

I already posted about the teachery books I will be reading this summer and I still have quite a lot of progress to make, but I am pretty confident I am going to find some other books to add to my list of things I want to read on this cool Summer Reading page on Pinterest. There are a lot of interesting books on there! 

What's your summer reading style? 

Do you read for pleasure or are you diving into some good teachery texts?