Reading, Setting an Example

Reading is important to me. It’s something we’ve tried to instill in our children from early on. We’ve always read to our kids since they were very little. Before they could even fully comprehend what was happening. Jen still reads all the time to the young kids she cares for.

One thing I’m bad for though is not setting the example. For a long time my kids would never have seen me sitting down to read for myself. Lots of the reading I did was either in my office, on the computer, or when they were in bed. Reading more has been a goal of mine for some time now, but haven’t done a great job at working at it. In the past couple of years though I have read more books than I had in years, but that’s still not a big number.

Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about Fatherhood and Parenting in general but I’ll write more about that soon. Yesterday morning though I had just a small simple experience that helped remind me the effect we can have as parents on our children. Caile and I were home along for a bit of time. We were all ready, chores done and she was playing on her iPod in the living room. After making myself a coffee I came and joined her on the couch with my book I’ve been reading.

We talked a little bit, but for the most part we were each involved with our own task, or so I thought. Not long after I sat down with my book Caile got up and put her iPod away. She went to the kitchen and then came back with her book she’s been reading and we sat and read together until it was time for us to go meet everyone else.

On our drive I took the opportunity to talk about reading in general, it’s importance / benefits, and about the book she was reading. This wouldn’t have happened if she hadn’t seen me showing by example that reading was enjoyable and something worth me using my time to do.