9 tried-and-tested tips to encourage young people to enjoy reading

The family has an exemplary role to play in teaching children to read, long before the school takes over. Indeed, a taste for reading first appears through imitation. Then, with the help of pleasure, the motivation becomes internalized and the child begins to seek out this pleasure.

A question of interest

Motivation is a key factor in a child's success in learning to read[1], and readers are more likely to be interested in texts that reflect their personal experiences[2]. But this is not enough. For imitation[3] to become a deep-seated motivation, the child must have the freedom to construct his or her own reading project.

The great challenge for parents, teachers and other reading mediators is to encourage without constraining. In fact, any constraint on reading reduces the freedom needed to build reading behavior. Every time we put pressure on young people to read, we're counterproductive. And when young people read less, the pressure is even greater.

Constantly telling a child: "You must read", "It's serious and useful"; "You'd better read instead of...", without setting an example yourself, is already the beginning of a constraint. On the other hand, taking a child to the library, proposing a playful activity involving a book, is an incentive, not a constraint.

But then again, the books have to live up to their promise, and enthrall the young reader. Reading may seem like an activity of little interest to young Africans, who rarely have the opportunity to identify with the characters[4]. If they never manage to recognize themselves[5 ] in the texts, they may become disengaged from all activities associated with literature.

Texts should be like them, with stories that reflect their culture and personal experiences. If they see that reading plays a role in their own lives, this will sustain their motivation and interest in books.

By studying the reading behavior of young Cameroonians in Yaoundé[6], Louise Balock came to the conclusion that children with a regular reading habit come from families with a high social level. The results of her study confirm Bourdieu's[7 ] work on the role of education in cultural consumption, whatever the cultural practice in question (reading, performing arts, cinema, museum).

In short, here are a few tips to encourage your child, teenager or young person to read.

Stimulate curiosity and desire.

Adults and children alike are attracted by the forbidden. I remember that in Cameroon, some public places with the notice "N'urinez pas ici SVP" ("Please don't urinate here") were those where the practice had become very regular. But when the notice was changed to "Urinate here please! We need your urine". Citizens had drastically stopped doing so. The purpose of this little digression is simply to show that you can do the same for a good cause.

With the complicity of an older brother/sister or cousin who wants to lend a book to your children. You argue that it's not for their age (yes, it is) and that it's for another time. If one of them insists enough, you've almost got it.

1. Create a mini-library at home.
   
   
2. Having a variety of children's books, including comics, fantasy novels and so on, close at hand, will facilitate contact and a love of books. For example, if your child's bedroom is large enough, create a space to store his or her books. This space should be beautifully decorated to encourage your child to go there;
   
   
3. Develop playful activities around the book and, if necessary, provide rewards to whet your child's appetite. For example, if your child is reading about Kirikou's exploits, it's a good idea to have him or her watch the animated film at home or at the cinema. If his book is about the stars, take him to a planetarium. Here's a list with more fun activities based on the book.
   




4. Familiarize your child with the book by taking him to the library, for example, even if he's still very young. When you're there, offer them beautiful books with attractive or intriguing covers to whet their appetite for reading them. "Having books in the child's environment has a very positive effect on their lasting taste for books," says Alice Sterling Honig, a child development specialist at Syracuse University, New York.
   
   
5. Take an interest in his books. Yes, it's not enough to give your child books and expect him to love them instantly. Sometimes you have to read a few pages with him or her to show that the book or comic is interesting. No one is fooled, least of all young people.
   
   
6. Read around him too. Seeing you reading is the best proof of the book's importance. You can't preach what you don't practice. And an example is worth a thousand words.
   
   
7. Organize family reading activities where you can read the book out loud together.
   
   In doing so, you need to create a ritual, a regular reading appointment (for example, in the evening before bedtime or after meals, during digestion time) that will naturally anchor this time of day as the time for reading, and erase any sense of obligation, until the day when they appropriate this special moment on their own. This can take time: several weeks, several books, but by carefully selecting your joint readings, you'll get just as much pleasure from your new accomplices and future reading enthusiasts.




8. Suggest audiobooks. Listening to books is also a form of reading that requires less visual input, but develops your child's visualization and imagination faculties. "Listening to a quiet reading of a book is a good way of experimenting with fluency, that ability to read a text accurately and quickly with good expression," reveals Elissa Mostransky, a primary school reading teacher and mother of 4. If your child has a tablet, you can install the audible.com app, where he or she can read books to his or her heart's content.
   
   
9. Offer a wide variety of children's books. This allows children to explore and find what suits their taste. If your child is very young, you can offer him books. But don't wait until he's finished reading one before buying him another. That's as absurd as thinking of buying him a single pair of socks, waiting for them to wear out before buying another. Instead, offer him books whether or not he's finished them, because the more he sees different authors, different worlds and different covers, the more likely it is that something will click.
   
   

The list is far from exhaustive. However, I hope they will help you to help your children and students enjoy reading and develop a taste for it.

Illustration by @freepik