Help Your Kids Catch the

Reading Bug This Summer

Part 3

by Kathy Sena

Join the Club

Set An Example

Get 'em Hooked

Join the Club

Encourage your child to sign up for a reading club at your local library, suggests Falk. Reading clubs make reading 'cool' she says, and often include reading-related activities and fun prizes.

Set an Example

Let your child see you reading for pleasure. My mother-in-law, a retired reading specialist, still marvels at the fact that when my husband, Randy, was in kindergarten, she discovered him reading the San Francisco Chronicle sports page. If his dad hadn't made it obvious how much fun it was to follow the Giants in the paper each morning, I'm sure Randy wouldn't have paid any attention she says.

Try to encourage all kinds of breakfast reading, suggests Trelease. (Nutrition nightmares aside, remember how much fun it was to read the back of the Captain Crunch box?) During the summer, when a kid's morning can be a bit less rushed, make sure a few fun books are within easy reach at the breakfast table Trelease adds.

Getem Hooked

Maybe, like me, you couldn't get enough of Nancy Drew when you were a kid. Today, Harry Potter books are the rage for kids over age 7. They're the best thing since the invention of the paperback, raves Trelease, of the series by J.K. Rowling.

I thought getting Trelease to nail down his favorite kid book would be impossible. Not so. If you want your child to fall in love with books, he says, grab a copy of Shel Silversteis wacky collection of poems, Where the Sidewalk Ends  (HarperCollins; 1974).

So I did. And this summer, we're starting each day at our house with silly poems such as "Recipe For a Hippopotamus Sandwich" and "Ickle Me,

Pickle Me, Tickle Me Too." We're often late for breakfast, because someone invariably begs, "Just one more, pleeease!"

But that's OK. It's summer.