Your Child’s Skills and Interest in Reading: Attitude Counts!

When measuring your child’s skills and interest in reading, attitude counts!

This article will look at your child’s attitude or emotional response to reading. You might not think that attitude is important—or certainly not as important as accuracy and vocabulary.

But in fact, people generally avoid things they find difficult or unpleasant and spend more time doing things they find easy and rewarding. We don’t have to force ourselves to do the things we enjoy.

Materials you will need for this activity:

• The calendar or chart you started last week where you keep track of your child’s reading
• Pen/pencil

What you will do:

• As with the other exercises, reduce distractions. Turn off electronic media to reduce background noise and create a quiet space so that your child can read uninterrupted.
• You may wish to set some rules, for instance, no TV, texting, talking on the phone, or games during certain hours that are set aside for studying and reading.
• Make notes about your child’s attitude and mood when they are reading. Does he or she grumble about having to read? Get up repeatedly? Seem deeply engrossed in the reading material?

If your child seems consistently unhappy, stressed, or inattentive, or if your child creates family fights or arguments that have to do with reading, you might want to seek a professional evaluation to find out what’s causing that attitude. With the help of a licensed clinician, reading disabilities can be corrected; getting help for a child who’s struggling to read is a gift that will yield benefits for the rest of the child’s life. To find a Lexercise clinician in your area, just email us at info@lexercise.com or give us a call at 919-747-4557.