The New York Times – Motoko Rich
“Cue the hand-wringing about digital distraction: Fewer children are reading books frequently for fun, according to a new report released Thursday by Scholastic, the children’s book publisher. In a 2014 survey of just over 1,000 children ages 6 to 17, only 31 percent said they read a book for fun almost daily, down from 37 percent four years ago…There were some consistent patterns among the heavier readers: For the younger children ages 6 to 11 being read aloud to regularly and having restricted online time were correlated with frequent reading…The finding about reading aloud to children long after toddlerhood may come as a surprise to some parents who read books to children at bedtime when they were very young but then tapered off…A lot of parents assume that once kids begin to read independently, that now that is the best thing for them to do…But reading aloud through elementary school seemed to be connected to a love of reading generally…some literacy experts said that when parents or teachers read aloud to children even after they can read themselves, the children can hear more complex words or stories than they might tackle themselves.”(more)