Reading aloud to the kids changed the way I read

I wasn't much of a reader when I began reading to my older daughter every night, around ten years ago, and I quickly realized there are two kinds of reading to children.

The first is the “I am saying the words out loud, but my mind is elsewhere” kind of superficial reading. This is a total waste of time. The kids ask many questions, and I encourage them, but if my mind is not there, I cannot answer them. Another problem is that I cannot put emotion into the text. Without being present in the moment, I cannot anticipate the emotional tone, and it just comes out dull.

The second kind is fully engaged reading, and it is naturally more demanding. It requires me to understand the situation and read ahead of my own voice to anticipate shifts in emotion and tone. Sometimes I alter my voice to match emotions or characters in dialogue, and to avoid messing it up, I learned to maintain a small buffer — reading slightly ahead so I know when an emotion or character is about to change and can adjust my voice accordingly.

The latter kind, I believe, is the better way to read to the kids. But it is demanding, and I can only do it if I am truly interested in the book. That is why I spend many hours in bookstores searching for books that are interesting not only for the kids but for me as well.

Over the years, this active mode of reading made me a better reader. I always aspired to read outside my professional domain, but I was not capable of doing so. I could not maintain focus. My mind would drift unnoticed, and I would find myself having read several pages with no idea what I had just read.

I now understand that reading is a skill that must be developed over time, through books that are genuinely interesting.

Both my daughters can now focus their attention on books and are on their way to becoming good readers. Reading to them from an early age turned out to be so rewarding for all of us.