Encouraging Kids to Read

The primary reason your child should read has to do with the importance of God’s Word. Those who view reading with disdain are much less likely to regularly read Scripture for themselves, but there is no substitute for personal Bible reading.

This is well illustrated by the fact that the invention of the printing press and the subsequent proliferation of the Bible in the common tongues of Europe opened the door for the Protestant Reformation. No longer could the Catholic Church authoritatively claim that their doctrines were found in Scripture. The simplest farmer could now read the very Word of God (or have someone else read it to him) and decide for himself if the parish priest was telling the truth.

This ability to personally evaluate claims from the pulpit is also baked into the American heritage. Indeed, the entire purpose of schools in the early colonial period was to teach children to read so they could understand Scripture.

However, it is not just important to be able to read Scripture. Scripture is foundational to understanding our world, but being able to read other books is also important—including books by those who disparage Scripture. If you do not know the arguments of your opposition, you cannot effectively refute them. Further, children need to know how to defend their own position, and reading books can help with that too.

So how do you get your kids to read? Here are a few suggestions:

1. Read to them. This seems obvious, but it’s so easy to miss. Read books to your children when they are young. Do it regularly. Maybe not every day, but at least weekly. And give them books that they can pretend to read themselves. As they get older, teach them to read. Then let them read to you. Let them stumble through their board books, then their kids paperbacks. It will encourage them to continue reading.

2. Get them books they like. Again, this sounds so obvious and simple, but it is easy to miss. It’s easy to fall into the temptation to only get them books you or your spouse like. Don’t do it. Let your boys read about heroes of the faith, slaying dragons, and how to craft bows and arrows. Let your girls read missionary biographies, romances, and gardening books.

   Don’t try to force them to read books they hate. Many homeschool families mandate reading the classics. But asking most boys to read Pride and Prejudice, or most girls to read The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, will not end well. And many of the classics have a worldview that is antithetical to the biblical one, so it is wise to review book choices rather than simply follow a given curriculum.

3. Tell them stories. This one is slightly less obvious, but it’s equally important. Children learn to love stories because of the stories their parents tell them. My brothers and I loved hearing our dad tell stories about his childhood. But it need not be limited to personal experience. If you are creative, invent worlds for your children to explore. Or if you have a deep knowledge of one area of history, say World War II, tell them stories set there. The Victorian writer G. A. Henty wrote something like 100 books for boys, but he began simply by telling stories to his children and the neighborhood boys.

   You may never write books, but your stories may inspire your children to read others. If that happens, your stories will be eminently worthwhile. If you get a particular anecdote from a book, tell your children that’s where it came from. It may impress upon them that books contain interesting and worthwhile knowledge and thus inspire them to read.

You may have noticed that all three of these ideas involve you, the parent. That’s because it is very easy to tell children to read. It is much harder to set the example of reading. You should be reading the Bible daily. Your children will notice. You should be reading other books as well, maybe not daily but regularly. Your children will notice that too and act accordingly.

There are many ways you can personalize these suggestions for your own children. What matters most is that your children learn to love to read. We have many books available for children from preschool to high school, and these may help you inspire your children to read. But ultimately the responsibility falls to you, the parent, to motivate your child. Being a parent has many responsibilities; reading is only a small part of them. But it is an important one, one that you would do well to emphasize and promote.