1000 book experiences

My in laws are VERY VERY big on education.. BIL is a teacher, MIL has her masters in something to do with teaching and works for ERO and taught for years, FIL lectures in teaching at Massey and has his phd about something in reading recovery. Like I said, very big on education..

Anyhow.. they are always talking about books and schooling etc and they were talking about a new study they have been introduced to and were comparing it with their own teaching experiences.

The jist of it was that every child should have 1000 book experiences by the time they go to primary school in order to keep up with their age appropriate learning. Do you think your kids would get this? or have had this?

They spoke about how when they taught new entrants classes in various places and classes that MIL has seen while working for ERO that some kids have to be taught how to turn pages of a book! I was stunned as Daniel already knows how to do this (with his board books).

yeh - I think 1000 would be a tad low but there are kids out there, like you say, have no experience at all! Very sad!

Same here - Caitlin has no choice lol she has heaps of books and she loves them (now that we're over the "eating the book" stage )

On Maya's first day of school she brought home a book of poems with a note in the front saying that it was to "teach the basic principles of reading, such as how to turn the page, that text reads from left to right..." etc.
I was shocked! My 17 mth olds know how to turn a page, and Maya knew that text was left to right from about age 2, at 5 she recognises sight words and can write some of them.
It did make me feel sad tho that obviously some kids DO start school not knowing these things
My kids are doomed to be throttled with books too having a writer for a mother, but that's definitely been a good thing in my experience!
And I have to say I also think quality ECE is hugely important, Playcentre and the like have their place, and kids need to play, but they also need to learn in a structured environment.

a tip I was given - or read - can't remember about reading to boys - is that they often won't sit and be read to - but they love it all the same. So i let my boys play around while I read to them, and I ask them questions about it. 9/10 they know the answer, but they are fidgeting the whole time.

Alia, the gremlins mostly eat books and turn the pages if/when they want to. I just run with it, one day they'll figure it out.

Yeah it's not hard to reach. But some kids get nadda

I read a book when Tom was a newborn (cant remember what it was called) but it was about reading to your babies and how it teaches them the basics as Emma said liek turning page and reading from L-R. It said that some kids really dont ever get those skills till the start school and I think it also mentioned the 1000 books thing.

They did studies with underpriveledged kids and made their parents read to them each day and compared that with other families that dont read and there were remarkable differences.

It makes you realise how important what we do now is for our kids' futures. In saying that I am guilty of not reading every day to Tom...mainly because he likes to chew them and shut them...but I keep on trying. They recommended giving the baby a different book and reading another while they chew on the first (Tom just wants the one I hold). They also said you dont have to read word for word and you can skip to the bits they like etc. Also the children that are read to can tell when you are reading story and when you are talking about the story.

that is a cool idea.

We need more books.

What are your favourite titles....I know Ill start a new thread.

Maya wrote: Alia, the gremlins mostly eat books and turn the pages if/when they want to. I just run with it, one day they'll figure it out.

Well if that's reading, then Seb reads to himself every day

Most of his books are gifts (just like most of his toys) as we have some, and I can't really justify buying more when we don't have alot of money, and he's just going to trash them for a while anyway.

The tooth fairy idea sounds great for when he's older. I'll keep that in mind

Both me and mike love reading, (I think partly why we hate seeing him ruin books)

We always give books as pressies too... in fact we have a whole heap in our 'gift box' that I buy on special. No child gets a pressie from us without some sort of book in it

We have the cutest video of DH reading Dr Seuss to Harry when he was a week old. Harry was just staring at the page so intently and looking like he was really listening carefully. At the moment he likes his board book with a big coloured photo on each page (he likes looking at the duck) and also his "guess how much I love you" (I think that's what it's called.... big nutbrown hare and little nutbrown hare). And this cool as board book called Where is the Green Sheep.