Book Day: The Perfect Occasion to Rekindle a a Love of Reading
Every April 23rd is celebrated worldwide as Book Day, and this special date is dedicated to promoting the love of reading and honoring the contribution of so many writers. If you have little ones at home, this can be a great time to remind them of the valuable resource that books are and also to reinforce their reading habits.
Books are the primary means of preserving and transmitting knowledge. They allow us to understand the world, acquire skills, and discover fascinating facts and figures. In addition, they favor the development of language, help us to express ourselves better, and let our imagination run wild. By reading, we can travel to a thousand places and live a thousand lives.
For all these benefits, children shouldn’t see reading as an obligation, but as entertainment. That refuge where they can go to have fun, relax, reflect, or share with others. The question is, how can we achieve this?
Promote a love of reading in your children
By encouraging the habit of reading in young children, what we’re really doing is introducing them to those paper friends who’ll be with them for life. This is an extremely valuable resource.
However, imposition isn’t the way to transmit this love. Rather, to achieve this goal, we recommend you apply the following guidelines:
- Practice shared reading with your children from the time they’re young. Read aloud to them, let them touch the pages, let them point to the pictures, and let them become familiar with this healthy form of leisure.
- Make sure that, at home, books are within your children’s reach. This way, they’ll be able to pick them up by themselves whenever they want. You can create a cozy reading corner, with drawers or shelves at their height.
- Establish a habit for your children to read for at least half an hour every day. This shouldn’t be an imposition, but an encouragement. For example, little ones love to be read a bedtime story, and, as they get older, they’ll probably enjoy that extra half hour to stay awake and immerse themselves in their favorite stories. The idea is to set aside a space to indulge in reading.
- Allow your child to explore their tastes and respect them. A common mistake we adults make is to try to impose on our children the readings that seem most convenient for them. However, some children will want to read fiction, others will want to learn about dinosaurs, and others about outer space. Allow them to explore the options available and choose the ones that most appeal to them.
- Be an example of how reading is an enjoyable pastime that’s worth spending time with willingly. Read every day, together with your child and alone. Enjoy those readings that please you, and you’ll see that your child will imitate this behavior.
The best children’s stories to celebrate Book Day
As we’ve said, there’s a wide variety of things to read and each child may have different tastes. However, we’ll offer you some recommendations of stories and children’s books that your children may like. What better way to celebrate Book Day than discovering new works that enrich their physical and mental library?
Peek-A-Blue: What’s in Your Diaper?
The endearing little mouse that stars in this story can encourage your little one in the process of leaving the diaper behind. This story is fun and interactive, as it has different flaps that the child can unfold. In addition to the touch of humor that characterizes it, it uses short sentences that are very easy to understand for 2-year-olds.
Guess how much I love you
This book is recommended for children from 3 to 6 years old and shows us how, sometimes, it’s complicated to express and describe what we feel. It’s a very tender story that you’ll enjoy reading together.
The Colour Monster
Surely you’ve heard of this children’s book because it’s one of the most acclaimed in recent years.
Hand in hand with this peculiar and monstrous protagonist, children will learn to understand their emotions, identify them, and know how to manage them.
Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls
If your children are a little older (between six and eight years old), this book and the next one we’ll suggest will be a great inspiration for them. Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls tells the stories of 100 courageous and successful women who’ve made great achievements in various fields, such as science, art, sports, and more.
It’s an essential work for our girls to grow up with healthy and diverse female references.
Stories for Boys Who Dare to Be Different
And what about boys? They too need inspiration and role models to find and accept themselves. This book shows that masculinity can be seen in very different ways and that certain values and characteristics such as introversion, compassion, and sensitivity have a place in it.
Emotionary: Say What You Feel
If you don’t have a copy of the Emotionary in your home, this should be your next acquisition. It’s a complete dictionary of emotions that will be very useful for both you and your children during their childhood and adolescence.
This work helps to identify, differentiate, name, and understand multiple human emotions. It’s very useful to improve expression, empathy, and self-knowledge.
On Book Day, turn to the classics
If your children are approaching adolescence, they’ll love to read some of the classics of young adult literature that they may not yet know. Matilda, The Neverending Story, the saga of Harry Potter, Tom Sawyer, or Journey to the Center of the Earth are some titles that constitute a sure hit.
I have lived a thousand lives and I’ve loved a thousand loves. I’ve walked on distant worlds and seen the end of time. Because I read.
-George R. R. Martin-
Book Day, an opportunity to rekindle the love of reading
In short, the love of reading is cultivated from childhood and reinforced for life. Therefore, it becomes a habit, a refuge, and a personal pleasure.
However, not all children have received this legacy, and that’s why Book Day is an excellent occasion to reflect on the wonderful opportunities that reading offers us. And also, to discover new titles ideal for the whole family. Which ones are you going to start with?
All cited sources were thoroughly reviewed by our team to ensure their quality, reliability, currency, and validity. The bibliography of this article was considered reliable and of academic or scientific accuracy.
- Goikoetxea, E., & Martínez, N. (2015). Los beneficios de la lectura compartida de libros: breve revisión. Educación XX1, 18(1), 303-324. https://www.redalyc.org/pdf/706/70632585013.pdf
- Morón, M. C. (2010). Los beneficios de la literatura infantil. Revista digital para profesionales de la enseñanza, 6.