How did my parents encourage me to develop a lifelong appreciation for books?

How did my parents encourage me to develop
a lifelong appreciation for books?

Hi my name is RJ Simon, and I love books!
I create illustrations for books, write stories for books, read books, and I collect books! I also like learning about books and doing other bookish things too. Books are amazing!

I’ve been thinking about why I developed an interest in books. I wrote down everything I could think of and it turned out way too big for one post so today I’m just going to focus on some of the wonderful bookish things my parents did for me when I was growing up.

I’d like inspire everyone to increase their appreciation of books!

Sharing bedtime stories with your children

Yep, you’ve heard it before: bedtime stories are wonderful!

I have fond memories of my mother reading me bed time stories, I loved it! I could write a whole book about how much I enjoyed being tucked up all cosy in bed listening to my mother read. Oh what fun it was selecting the books, pointing at the pictures, and discussing the stories!
When I grew up and had my own children I made sure that bed time stories were included as part of the nightly routine just like dinner, bathing, pyjamas, and brushing teeth – well actually it’s something we started to do before they even had teeth.

*You do not need teeth to enjoy books.'
*The love of reading can be passed on through the generations by including/creating reading traditions & routines'

The Joy of stories & Audio Books

I was a very lucky child. I always had a cassette player and that meant that I could listen to stories narrated by story tellers. Some of those stories on tape came with books and I’d know when to turn the page when I heard the bell chime. (If you’ve ever listened to an old Disney read-a-long book you might know how exciting that bell chime can be! One of my favourites was 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea). Now days, you might not have a cassette player, but you can still find a fantastic range of audio books for children.

Reading by example

Growing up I don’t remember a day when I didn’t see my parents reading.

Because my parents are both avid readers:

Books have been familiar objects all of my life
I grew up thinking reading was a normal daily activity like eating or sleeping

Because my parents read, and my grandparents read, and my teachers read, and other adults I knew read, so I grew up assuming everyone who was old enough to read did so daily...

Reading for a purpose

I saw adults reading a huge variety of books, and I saw that they read books for a purpose.

For example:

They read books for entertainment
They read to learn

As I got older I realised not all adults enjoy reading books the way that my parents, teachers, and grandparents did. It’s a sad realization because books are fantastic!
If you want to encourage your children to develop a lifelong appreciation of books – read by example, let them see you enjoying books. Let them see you laughing while you read, or staring so intensely at pages that you don’t even break your gaze as your hand fumbles about for the cup of tea beside you... unless you don’t drink tea of course because that would be weird.

*When a child sees their parent captivated by an object, that object will make a lasting impression.

Reading in different places

My mother modeled this behaviour fantastically – she read all over the place and I’m pretty sure she still does!

Here’s a list of places you might like to let your children see you reading:

•   On a bus, plane, train
•   At the beach
•   At the park
•   In waiting rooms
•   At home, church, school, or work
•   In a garden
•   In the kitchen
•   At a café

Libraries are amazing!

Weekly trips to the library were a part of our family's routine. I’m pretty sure it was usually my father’s idea – he is one of the most avid readers I’ve ever met!

Going to the library was one of my favourite outings it was always EXCITING! A trip to a library is like a treasure hunt and free shopping all at once! Obviously you can’t keep the things that you borrow from the library – so it’s not exactly the same as shopping but there are a lot of upsides to that. I’ll write a more about why libraries are amazing and the benefits of borrowing books later.

Books make wonderful gifts!

My parents and my grandparents, used to give me books sometimes for Christmas, sometimes for birthdays, sometimes just because. It was fantastic to unwrap a flat packed world that I could hold in my hands and visit whenever I wanted! I still have many of the books I was given as a child and I still treasure them and I still read them every now and then.

*Do you think that when an object is wrapped up and given as a gift – it makes that object just a little more special?

Talking to your children about books

Yep, my parents talked about books. They told me about some of the books they like when they were children and they talked about why they liked them too. Hearing about why my parents appreciated books when they were children helped me to understand that books can be fun for every age group.

I’ll be adding some fun book appreciation activities here soon. In the meantime, you might like to have a look at my book review page for a list of my favourite children's book review sites.

Research and articles of interest