Episode 91–How to make reading fun over the summer.

[00:00:00] Speaker A: Hi, I'm Maggie. [00:00:01] Speaker B: And I'm Nicole. Welcome to the DAC Dyslexia and Coffee Podcast. We're so happy you could join us. We're both moms and dyslexia interventionists who want to talk about our students and children. What dyslexia is, how it affects our kids, strategies to help and topics related to other learning disabilities will also be covered in this podcast. Parents are not alone and we want to give voice to the concerns struggles we are all having. This is a safe place to learn more about how to help our children grow and succeed in school and in the world. Grab a cup of coffee and enjoy the conversation. [00:00:34] Speaker A: Hi, everybody. Welcome to episode 91 of Dyslexia and Coffee Podcast. Yay. We're happy you're here with us today. We're gonna start today's episode like we do every week with the concept of the week. So the concept of the week is our opportunity as practitioners to kind of peel back that curtain a little bit and let everyone into an interest session. I like to teach about things that either we would teach directly to our students or to their parents and caregivers. So today's concept of the week is partner reading. Partner reading is actually an instructional strategy. It is highly research based and it is where we pair students with either similar reading abilities or strategically at different reading levels. And they take turns reading the same passage to each other and then giving each other feedback. While that's happening, the teacher is circulating and so they are hearing every student read and they're also hearing the kind of feedback that they're giving to each other. So when done with fidelity, what that does is allow both a struggling reader to receive some feedback and then also to give feedback to a peer. And then you also hear modeled fluent reading. So this strategy definitely takes planning and it requires the teacher to strategically do choose reading partners that will be good reading and partners. And usually they're changed up a lot. Usually you have a reading partner for a couple of weeks and then we change them around. And it can also be used at home, which is why I wanted to talk about it here. So this strategy can also be used at home where a parent is a fluent reader, right. And they're going to read with their with their kid at home and they can take some turns. A parent can give some feedback to a kid who is reading to them and a kid can ask some comprehension questions to the parent as they're writing, as they're reading as well. So it's a way to make reading with Your kid a connection time. And also it's research based. So those, I think a lot of us who read with our kids at home pro probably already are doing this without really realizing that actually this is a research backed strategy that we can all use well. [00:03:28] Speaker B: Welcome to episode 91, how to make reading fun over the summer. [00:03:33] Speaker A: Yay. [00:03:35] Speaker B: Fun topic today. [00:03:37] Speaker A: Yes. I feel like, okay, we have made it to summer. Good news, everybody. We've made it to summer. Bad news, everybody. We have made it to summer. [00:03:54] Speaker B: Well, first thing, the library has many, many activities that are free throughout the summer. And they use lots of reading integrated into those activities. So that's one really easy way for a lot of families to get some reading in. And in a way that maybe you're not the one picking everything. [00:04:18] Speaker A: Yes. [00:04:18] Speaker B: But you're still engaged in the activities with your child and you can still kind of have fun with the scavenger hunts and the other things that they put on all summer long. [00:04:30] Speaker A: I am such a fan of, of our public library. They do so many programs, not just for the young kids. I think sometimes we think of like library programs. We think of the adorable little story programs, and those are so cute and so good for kids, all the things. But our local library does so many really good teen groups and even like young adult reading groups that they do video games at the library. And some of them will like play a video game and then they'll read a graphic novel that's based on a video game and they'll talk about it. Or sometimes it's just being in the library at the library, getting that idea of how literature. Right. And being just around a library is such a good community learning opportunity. And I know it's not just my public library, even though I'm very partial to it. Libraries and librarians do so much work to coordinate all of that. And [00:05:56] Speaker B: yeah, our library also has like a special section for like middle schoolers and they like, put them in their own little room and so that they can socialize and read at the same time. [00:06:08] Speaker A: Yeah. Out. One of the public libraries out in Northlake, Northlake has a like, makerspace. [00:06:18] Speaker B: Okay. [00:06:19] Speaker A: And it's open to anybody, really. But they do have certain hours that are for older kids and certain hours that are for younger kids and they kind of swap out what materials are in there. And it's. It's really, really cool. Our county and other libraries are like this too. Our county, Waukesha County, Wisconsin. All of the public libraries in our county are kind of part of the same group. [00:06:55] Speaker B: Right. So you can take a book out from any of them and turn them in at any of them. And it doesn't matter if you go back to the same one because they just interchange those books back and forth. [00:07:05] Speaker A: Awesome. [00:07:06] Speaker B: It does help. [00:07:07] Speaker A: They usually run a program in the summer where they do each local library has like a clue. And you can go to all of the public libraries. Like, their goal is to get you to go to as many public libraries as they can over the summertime. And so you go to each library and you have to ask a librarian for a clue. And then if you figure the whole thing out, you get a prize at the end. [00:07:39] Speaker B: Yeah. So there's lots of different variety of library activities that can definitely keep reading on the forefront in the summer. [00:07:46] Speaker A: And it makes it so much less work on the parent. Because honestly, I mean, just going to the library and asking the librarian for help figuring out what kinds of books. [00:07:59] Speaker B: Right. For the age level. [00:08:01] Speaker A: Exactly. Interest level, that can be so overwhelming. And sometimes I have one child specifically like this where if I say, hey, you might like this book, he will say, I will not read that book. He will say, nope, not doing it. But if a librarian said, hey, you might enjoy this book, he is going to be way more apt to. [00:08:30] Speaker B: To enjoy that book. [00:08:31] Speaker A: Enjoy that book. [00:08:35] Speaker B: Gotta love kids. [00:08:37] Speaker A: So one of the things that I would make a really fun summer reading activity is the Reading Rockets website. They have activity kits that you can actually Download. So they're PDFs that you can download. They're all free. Free from Reading Rockets website? Yeah. They include a fiction and nonfiction book. So they're kind of organized around topics like animals. And they give you a fiction book and a nonfiction book to read and then a craft that kind of goes along with that topic. And they have these kits all the way from like pre K and kindergarten to grades two and three. I think they could be pretty easily adapted up or down. But again, it's just a way of making it fun and kind of making it an activity or something that you're gonna do together. These would be such a good. When it gets way too hot on a summer afternoon. Right. Or too rainy or too rainy. You know, you just need something that's a little more low key as an activity. They're really simple and they cost you really nothing. [00:10:10] Speaker B: Right. [00:10:11] Speaker A: So those are always really good things to do. They also have a companion website which is called Start with a Book. [00:10:23] Speaker B: Okay. [00:10:25] Speaker A: They have a curated list of children's books organized around topics of high interest like bugs or oceans or dinosaurs. And they'll kind of tell you what age level these books are written for. Is it fiction? Is it nonfiction? And then they. They too have some activities that you could potentially do alongside these topics. [00:10:53] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:10:54] Speaker A: So it takes. Again, it's like taking the work out of it from a parent perspective. If I have somewhere that I can start, it makes it more. [00:11:06] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:11:08] Speaker A: Way easier on me, which means I'm gonna actually be able to do it at home. [00:11:14] Speaker B: Right. [00:11:15] Speaker A: It's practical. [00:11:16] Speaker B: It is practical. So anybody who grew up when I did will know this program. So the Pizza Hut brought back their book it program, which is when you know that free reading incentive where you keep track of all the kids reading goals and then they earn a personal pizza at the end, which was always so much fun for everybody. So that is back in action. They took it off for a while. [00:11:50] Speaker A: Yeah. It was not a long time, but [00:11:52] Speaker B: they brought it back. [00:11:53] Speaker A: Yeah. Book it is back, people. It's back. [00:11:59] Speaker B: I always wondered why our kids didn't have that when there were other businesses that do have something like that. Like, yes, I know one of the area ice cream shops around here will give a free ice cream if you bring it in, if the teacher gives it to you for doing something reading related. So, I mean, there's different other things out there too, to look for that might be more local or maybe just a different business that is doing it a different way. But that's also an easy way to get it, to be an incentive, [00:12:34] Speaker A: something to look forward to, you know, and parents get to kind of track it. Right. So you get to. You get to give credit to your kid based on what you know they can do. Correct. There are several other businesses, like in addition to Pizza Hut, who do this. And I bet if you researched in your own area. I think one of the bowling alleys does. Oh, that can be as well. Which. That would be kind of fun. You know, read books, get to go bowling. You know, always pairing reading with something fun. I mean, we. The research is very clear that kids who continue to read over the summer do not experience as much of that summer slide as students who do not read over the summer. Students who do no reading over the summer can lose up to a third of a grade level of progress, which is a lot. Which is a lot of progress. So when we have, especially those struggling readers, I think some advice that is a little misplaced without guardrails on it is like, just make your kid read more. Well, hold on. It's not necessarily about just more reading. It's kind of what kind of Reading is your student doing? How are we making it fun for them? Because I love to read. Nicole loves to read. Right. But listen, not all of our kids love to read. And the real, real truth is we're not going to be able to flip, force them to love reading, but we can introduce it in more fun ways that incentivize it. And we hope one day, like, maybe [00:14:53] Speaker B: one day they'll just love it and [00:14:54] Speaker A: they want to read forever. I hope so. I hope that for the world. But that's not really within our control. [00:15:02] Speaker B: Correct. Another thing you can do is either go to the zoo, local park, or museum, because there are a lot of chances to read throughout the whole experience. You know, you read about what the animals do, where they are from, what their babies do. [00:15:20] Speaker A: Yes. [00:15:20] Speaker B: All those things are throughout the entire experience. And you can learn about, like, in the state parks, they have stuff about the different plants, the. The different trees, and then in the museums about the different history pieces. So, I mean, there's so many different ways to incorporate that reading and just an everyday outing to something that's fun. And usually our children don't even know that they're reading. [00:15:48] Speaker A: Well, exactly, Exactly. It's such a. It. It's one of those things that may seem obvious, but it counts towards our kind of. Right. Our research back. 20 minutes a day is what our brains need to continue to lock in and make progress. That all counts. Something that we've been doing in our family is kind of a monthly library trip where we all go to the library, we pick out whatever books we're gonna pick out, and sometimes we just stay at the library and read. But a lot of times we'll go home and I'll make kind of a special snack, and then we'll just read. [00:16:33] Speaker B: Oh, that sounds like fun. [00:16:35] Speaker A: It's really, really great. It's like I felt like I unlocked another, like, level in my kids now where it's like, oh, okay, you know, my youngest is six. We can do that kind of stuff a lot easier. [00:16:49] Speaker B: Right. [00:16:50] Speaker A: Than when they were younger. And it's just the more opportunities and kind of just pairing it with even. Even Aidan, who is not his preferred activity, but he will sit and do it. If there's, like, a special sack or if there's something in it for him, he will do it. And then he'll be glad that he did, because usually he's reading about very desired topics. [00:17:19] Speaker B: Right. [00:17:19] Speaker A: You know, I think I know what [00:17:22] Speaker B: we should do this summer. [00:17:23] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:17:23] Speaker B: We should have Wilson and Aiden pick books together. And then Sit and read to each other. [00:17:28] Speaker A: That would be so good. They would be perfect partner readers. [00:17:31] Speaker B: They would be. [00:17:31] Speaker A: That would be perfect. That would be so good. [00:17:35] Speaker B: Oh, my gosh. They would help each other so much. [00:17:37] Speaker A: They really would. [00:17:38] Speaker B: And they would probably do it because the other one was doing. [00:17:40] Speaker A: Oh, completely, completely. That would be such a motivator for them. You know, I think the deal with summer reading is to expect reading but not be so rigid about it like that. This is supposed to be fun. [00:18:00] Speaker B: Right. [00:18:00] Speaker A: And I think we can lean into the fun part about it when we're in summer break. [00:18:05] Speaker B: I agree. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I agree. Yeah, I know. For my daughter's school, she's middle school, and they had to. So she had to pick 10 books or series of books on her preferred type of reading. So she picked mysteries. Yeah. And so. Which is not easy to find 10, honestly. In that age bracket. [00:18:31] Speaker A: In that age bracket, yes. Exactly. [00:18:33] Speaker B: That. [00:18:33] Speaker A: That are like, oh, we start getting into some questionable other material. [00:18:39] Speaker B: Correct. Like that's too old for them. But we did find quite a few. And then she had to explain what the stories were going to be about and who were the main characters. And it was kind of a fun activity because now she has that list and it's already pre made. And I didn't make her. [00:18:56] Speaker A: Yeah, right. And you're like, hey, look it. That's so easy. [00:19:00] Speaker B: You're bored. Can look at that list and go find a book that's on that list. [00:19:03] Speaker A: Yeah, that's such a good idea. Our school usually does like a summer reading. And last year it was a map of the United States and it was broken up into regions. [00:19:18] Speaker B: Okay. [00:19:18] Speaker A: And they had three or four suggested children's book for each region. And you got a prize if you came back to school and. And had them kind of checked off. [00:19:29] Speaker B: Oh, cool. [00:19:30] Speaker A: On your map. So I thought that was really cool because they were. They were. They picked books about like Southern culture or out West. There were some, like, one was about like the Pueblos. And it was. There were some really cool books on there. And it was a list I didn't have to make, but I still had control over. Right. If there was a book on there that I was like, that's not for us. [00:19:55] Speaker B: Right. [00:19:56] Speaker A: No big deal. Didn't pick it out then. But it was a helpful. It was a helpful tool. And we did end up reading quite a few books off that list because our school district and our local library do a really good job talking to each other. [00:20:14] Speaker B: That makes sense. [00:20:15] Speaker A: So the public library had those books really Easily accessible. Like, they had a whole kind of display. [00:20:24] Speaker B: Oh, nice. [00:20:25] Speaker A: For our school district. That was about. That was all those books that they had picked. So they made it so easy, which was great. [00:20:37] Speaker B: And honestly, don't forget, too, that you can listen to. Have something. Listen. Have your student or child listen to a book on tape, follow along in a book that still counts. Or even just listening to a book to get the vocabulary and kind of stimulate the brain. That's still really good. So on those days when you're really busy with work. [00:20:59] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:20:59] Speaker B: You can still have them do those type of activities on their own. [00:21:03] Speaker A: Absolutely, absolutely. Audio books, listening to books. I will. That is reading. That is reading. Especially the sabarletum. Do it. It's fun. [00:21:18] Speaker B: Yes. I have a feeling we're going to go through a whole series on audiobooks. [00:21:23] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:21:23] Speaker B: Because all the kids were in the car listening to a book and all of a sudden they were all like. And I was like, oh, we're missed all these books, aren't we? Hopefully it's a good. [00:21:39] Speaker A: Scary. [00:21:41] Speaker B: Yeah, it actually is. It's just kind of really funny that usually the three of them do not. [00:21:47] Speaker A: I was gonna say it's fun, specifically with your kids, that all three of them are into the same thing. That's not the norm. So lean all the way into it. [00:21:59] Speaker B: I know, right? [00:22:01] Speaker A: Okay, this is what we do now. [00:22:06] Speaker B: So, Maggie, what's happening outside of dyslexia? [00:22:09] Speaker A: Oh, my gosh. Okay, so as we record this, it is the last week of May. [00:22:17] Speaker B: Yep. [00:22:20] Speaker A: So that's a lot. And it's been a lot. I recently found out that my children end school a whole week earlier than our original school calendar was printed. [00:22:37] Speaker B: I still think this is whole. [00:22:38] Speaker A: Yes, Nicole has heard my gripe. I was quite upset to find out that the school calendar, the physical school calendar that we were given. [00:22:52] Speaker B: Is not correct. [00:22:53] Speaker A: Is not correct. So I've been trying to figure out how exactly we're going to manage that week where the kids were supposed to be in school and are not in school. Because apparently school can change their mind about the last day of school. I'm sorry, but, yeah, I was so filled. I'm glad somebody thinks it's funny. What is going on with you, Nicole? [00:23:29] Speaker B: Well, I think should tell our listeners about. So we in this location have a lot of windows. We get visited by many different animals. And so we had a pair of cranes out the other day. And this is some other reading. You can sneak in if you want. But we had to look up to see what they were doing because they were acting very uniquely. And we did find out that they were trying to mate. But, like, we literally had a whole show in front of our window. [00:24:01] Speaker A: We sure did. [00:24:02] Speaker B: And we technically. [00:24:03] Speaker A: Yeah, there was a whole. [00:24:05] Speaker B: Definitely did not work for a while for. [00:24:07] Speaker A: Yeah, we were very interested in what these cranes were doing. That probably says a lot about where our brains are. [00:24:15] Speaker B: Yeah, whatever that day was. [00:24:17] Speaker A: Before that. Yeah, we had male and female cranes, puma, crane, sh. Showing off for one another and then went and disappeared into the woods. So. [00:24:27] Speaker B: Yeah, so. But it's. We get visited by bunnies, chipmunks and squirrels. [00:24:34] Speaker A: Woodchuck. [00:24:34] Speaker B: Woodchuck. Yeah. Nobody believed me until I was like, there's a thing. Right. Look at that thing. [00:24:40] Speaker A: Yeah, that was pretty cool. Yeah, this is. Yeah, our windows. Not only do we have a lot of windows, we're also on, like, the ground level. [00:24:50] Speaker B: Yeah. So we're a little bit below the windows. [00:24:53] Speaker A: Yes. [00:24:53] Speaker B: And so when they come to the window, they're at the grassland. [00:24:57] Speaker A: Yeah. Like, they're actually staring at us. [00:25:02] Speaker B: It's working. Very interesting. It really does. [00:25:03] Speaker A: Sometimes distracting. Agreed. But I will take the animal distraction any day. Really? Yes, definitely. Well, thank you, listeners. Please follow us on social media and reach out if you have any questions or you would like us to discuss a topic. If you do like our show, be sure to follow and rate our show on your favorite podcast player. This is how we reach more listeners and then we get to help more families. Thank you, everybody. [00:25:31] Speaker B: Thank you.