New Year reading resolutions

Do you make resolutions at the beginning of each new year? Many people’s resolutions involve giving up something they enjoy to improve their lives. But that’s where reading resolutions are different – they are simply about doing more of what you enjoy! Try our suggestions below to make reading and stories a part of your family’s everyday life! And download our Story Power Pacts for you and your children to display in your home.

• Set aside 20 to 30 minutes each day to read aloud to your children. Most children enjoy being read to just before bedtime but younger children may find it easier to concentrate at other times in the day or if you break the time into two shorter sessions. It really doesn’t matter when or for how long you read books together each day – it’s doing it regularly that counts.

• Spend some time with your children talking about their reading resolutions (or goals) for the year. Encourage them to write them down and write down yours too!  Perhaps you want to read more books in 2013 or different kinds of books or to read more often.

• Get into the habit of visiting your closest library with your children once a week. Libraries provide a good supply of free books for you to enjoy at home and some even offer storytimes and other activities for children. Allow enough time for your children to look at lots of books and for you to chat about them before deciding which ones to borrow.

• Share your favourite children’s books or childhood stories with your own children – and other children you know.

• Get to know at least one new children’s book each week by browsing through and reading from the collection of books available to you.

• Be adventurous together! Why don’t you and your children try a book by an author you or they have never read before and then try a book by another ‘new’ author each month? Encourage older readers to try books from various genres, like adventure stories, fantasy or biographies.

• With your children, make a list of their top five to ten favourite books and then enjoy re-reading some of them together.

• Find books written or published in the year of your child’s birth and read them together.

• Borrow or buy a book that teaches you how to do something new – for example, a recipe book or an arts and crafts book. Let each person choose one thing that they would like to learn how to make and then do the activity altogether.

• Help your children take the ‘read as many books as your height’ challenge! Measure their height in centimetres then invite them to try to read at least that number of books in 2013!

• If you are buying birthday presents for family members or friends in 2013, think about a book first as a gift possibility.

• Practise what you preach! Set aside some time each day to enjoy reading a book of your own.

 For more ways to make reading and stories the centre of your home, download our Story Power Pacts here.