There is currently a story on the New York Times giving expert advice on how to get your kids to read. It looks fine, as far as it goes, but it misses something important. Make reading bad.
I was a slow reader. I still remember 1st grade when my nice teacher would hand me a book, sit me down on some comfy beanbags next to a window and tell me to read. Without oversight, I had a choice, read or look at squirrels. To this day, I would choose the squirrels, which is why I don’t sit near a window when I read. In any case, as 2nd grade began, and I still could not read, my mother took a new approach—read or die. Every night after dinner she would sit me down at the kitchen table (nowhere near a window), and force me to read. After a few months I got it. To be clear, I am not suggesting this part of my parent’s child rearing as an example of best practices. It worked though.
There was, however, one incredible parenting trick that I still like to mention to anyone with kids. Once a kid has got reading down, make it bad. Make reading the activity that your kid does to piss you off, to tell you to go to hell, something secret, something illicit. Once I got to be about 10 or so, my parents brought me to the bookshelf in their room and told me I could read anything there I wanted to, except the books on the top right shelf. They told me those books were only for adults, and that I would get in big trouble if they found me reading them. Needless to say, at the first opportunity I pulled up a chair, pulled down a book, and started reading Catcher in the Rye.
I’m not trying to hold up my parents as the models of parenting, but I was the third of three sons--they’d figured out a thing or two over the years. So they made reading naughty, they made it an act of rebellion. They stocked that shelf with books that were a bit above me, that had sex, and swears, and drunks, and drugs. They stocked it with all sorts of books that give children ideas. I only figured out I had been had 2-3 years later, but by then I had read a ton of great stuff, and was hooked.
So, I pass this parenting advice to all and any who have children (since I do not). Make reading bad, forbid it. Make sure your kids know which books in the house they are not allowed to read, and make sure those books have some juicy stuff in them...and then pretend not to notice when they defy your orders and read them anyway.
Reading gives children ideas and makes them question your authority, at least it should.