Summer Reading for Kids with ADD

Kay Marner, a librarian and a mother of a child with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADD/ADHD), writes about summer reading in a good article at ADDitude Magazine's online edition. Although her tips are geared toward children with ADD and/or learning disabilities, they make a lot of sense for everyone else, too.

Marner says,"Reading quantity counts. There’s a strong relationship between the number of books read and a child’s improvement in reading ability. Reading at least four or five books each summer produces big skill-saving. Let your child choose books that fit his interests. Garfield—or, in [her daughter] Natalie’s case, Captain Underpants—is as effective in sharpening reading skills as are more serious books. Popular series—Harry Potter and others—are especially good at keeping children reading."

Check out the entire article here.

As far as our summer reading schedule goes, I plan to set aside one day a week as Library Day. For an hour or so on Thursday afternoons, say, we can stop by and return books, look for more, have a snack at the small cafe, and use the computer if we want.

What are you going to do for summer reading?

Comments

[adrienne]

Lucas and I are still in the midst of book five in our odyssey to read all the Harry Potter books out loud back-to-back (which we've been doing before school every day), and we don't want to break for the whole summer, so our plan is to get together a couple times a week to continue our read-aloud time.

[Mary Ann Dames - Reading, Writing, and Recipes]

I thin Marner's advice about letting the child choose books that fit his interest is sound for any age and ability. A book that sits unopened is not a good choice at all.

A library with a cafe! What will they think of next?

[Susan T.]

What fun, Adrienne! We have read the Wayside School books several times; I wonder how they'd hold up back to back...

Mary Ann, yes, the cafe is called As You Like It. They sell coffee, snacks, and sandwiches made at a local deli.

[Joseph Lira]

This is good advice, my cousin was not sure about books like harry potter for her daughter, but I will tell her about your post, this is useful info, thanks for sharing it.

[Z-Dad]

Both of our local libraries have great summer reading programs. Special events, goodies, lots of incentives. Our kids have really benefited from this over the years. I'm glad these libraries have kept it up even with all the funding cuts...

[NFL Jerseys]

I thin Marner's advice about letting the child choose books that fit his interest is sound for any age and ability.