Adults who read with children do not necessarily have to be their parents. They can also be other adults with whom they are not related.
The holidays are a time when children receive books as gifts, but to immerse themselves in that world of imagination and culture, adults need to read them with them so that the text read can be understood, says the Bofill Foundation based in Barcelona.
The Education Policy Research Organization notes that between 20 percent and 23.2 percent of students in Spain have low levels of reading comprehension, which is usually an indicator of school failure. Primary school children aged 8 and 9, whose parents read with them, are generally more advanced in understanding texts than children who do not read with their parents at home, adds the Foundation.
To enable children to read with adults if their parents are unable or unwilling to do so, she launched a special program called “Families, Reading Allies.” In education centers, libraries and social centers there are people ready to read with children and explain to parents how to do it.
The Foundation says that it is crucial to encourage reading outside of school in order to “avoid social exclusion” of children who grow up in an unfavorable environment, that is, to create students who are resistant to such an environment.
Juan Mata, pedagogue and professor for 40 years at the University of Granada, has studied this phenomenon in detail.
Sometimes it is thought that reading is only related to school, but this is not so. The school has an important role, but the key environment is the family, he says.
Children will adopt what they see around them as they grow up. What the family has already adopted, whether it’s reading, socializing, playing sports or dancing, will largely determine the child’s preferences, he adds.
This process, when it comes to reading, begins before the child enters school. Then it just keeps going.
The procedure should consist of reading aloud before bedtime, family conversations around books, going to bookstores with parents, having books, newspapers or magazines in your house. For gifts consisting of stories, comics or novels, Mata explains.
This ecosystem of books is decisive and, unfortunately, I say this with pain, starts the curve that separates children who naturally enter the world of reading from those who do not, he adds.
Reading comprehension has ramifications for almost all subjects in school.
If we can’t understand the text of a math problem, it will be difficult for us to solve it, notes Mata.
There is also a paradox he warns about. And it is that school, the best tool for students from poor homes, increases this inequality without being aware of it.
The textbooks are intended for children who read fluently. The concept of the textbook is adapted to children with already adopted vocabulary. And so slowly, almost from the beginning, the separation of children based on their reading ability begins and emerges later in middle school, Mata says.
Quim is about to turn six and every night before bed his father Luis Rivera reads with him at their home in Valencia. When he was a baby, Luis and his partner Helga read aloud pages from their books to him while he fell asleep in the bed between them.
Then they read him classic stories, such as “Ivica and Maritsa”. Now they usually go to the library to choose them together. They read them together and aloud.
Sometimes we burst out laughing for a while because some books have humor for both children and adults, says Luis. Quim says he really likes to read.
Carmen Canabate, a teacher in the southern city of Almería, has spent much of her career observing differences in children’s reading comprehension.
Children who grow up in families with a rich cultural environment, which is not limited to books, have a visible experience, says Canabate.
He notes that education centers and libraries can significantly reduce this gap if they provide children with reading companions or if they encourage parents to read with their children.
The lack of a close person, as a reading companion, usually has social roots. There are parents, says Juan Mata, who, for example, cannot do this because their working hours do not allow them.
Still others have low self-esteem regarding their ability to read and do not feel able to follow their children in it. Some think that it is not their job, but the task of the school, says Silvia Blanch, a professor at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona
The Bofill Foundation therefore launched a program in which 1,800 volunteers accompany children as they read in Catalan and Spanish.
Mario Armengou, a 76-year-old pensioner, has been introducing air conditioners to industrial plants for 40 years. He has been reading with children for ten years now.
I have no grandchildren, so I do the same for these children as I do for my grandchildren. It’s wonderful to see their eyes open as they progress, he says.
Children who grow up in an unfavorable family environment, and who still achieve excellent results in school, are good readers.
Alejandra, originally from Chile, enrolled her daughter in that program in Barcelona because she cannot help her read Catalan herself. He also can’t even help her with Spanish because she has to spend most of her time with another, autistic child.
The girl goes to primary school and says that attending the program has helped her. Now she feels more confident in class.
It helped me in both writing and reading. It used to be difficult for me to read, but now I really do it fluently, the girl points out.
