I�m a bit embarrassed to admit that my daughter and I have reached a standoff over reading. A year ago (at 4) she loved us reading Roald Dahl and the Famous Five and Lady Grace series (amongst other things). It was apparent that she understood them from the imaginative play that they generated and we loved reading them too.
Toward the end of last year dd (now 5) started to become really overwhelmed by worries about death, illness and injury and so on and we couldn't read about (watch, talk about) anything so much as a stomach ache without her becoming completely overwhelmed. These days she is much more generally ok with all those themes in day to day life, but she is still insistent about not going further in books at the first sign of something possibly confronting.
Now, when I say confronting I am talking about - as I said above - something as simple as a story with a stomach ache in it. I'm not talking murder and mayhem.
She'll still happily sit through the bone crunching giants of the BF - a story she knows well - and the kidnapping and adventure of the famous five. Her favorite TV show is Tom and Jerry, which she watches, laughing hysterically while Tom and Jerry are variously bashed and burned and broken. I think she just has a block about stories as a hangover from the height of her worrying last year. We've tried talking through whatever is happening in the story and how likely it is that something bad will actually happen, how bad would that be anyway etc. None of it works.
It has gotten to the point where she is back to only wanting us to read basic fairy books and anything she knows will not have anything confronting in it. These are books she can (and does read to herself) and if I am honest, they're books I am not really prepared to go back to reading (I have read over 80 of those freaking Rainbow Fairies, plus many many others in the same vein over the past couple of years... I've done my time!) So sick of these books are my husband and I that we specified said fairy books as books dd could choose to read to herself for fun while my husband and I would read those books that are a bit too wordy for her to remain engaged in if she's reading herself. We've now re-read everything that she's ok with us to read and she's refusing to allow us to read even the most carefully chosen alternatives, lest something �bad� happen.
I guess my concern is that by stopping at the first sign of trouble she never get the chance to understand that in general the characters will get through it in the end. And let�s face it, a story can�t exist without an element of tension.
So... I have refused to re-read Charlie and the Chocolate factory for the 15th time, I've refused to re-read the endless fairy/unicorn/magical creature early chapter books. I have said to dd that I will happily read from a selection of carefully chosen books or I will happily read non-fiction to her at story time and I've explained why I think it's important that we try something new. She has flat out refused and chosen to skip us reading to her and just read to herself.
This wasn't the outcome I expected and I don't know how I feel about it. Reading is something that is important to DH and I and I had planned to share reading with her for many more years to come. I used to spend hours reading to her, at her request, each day. But she doesn't seem terribly upset by it and happily reads on her own. She will still simply stop at anything that upsets her and refuse to go on, I am reluctant to push against it in this context as I think it is important that she's aware enough to stop reading to herself if the content makes her uncomfortable - particularly as she is now capable of reading anything she sets her mind to.
Am I doing the wrong thing? I am really conscious that there is an argument for just reading what she wants read to her, just for the sake of reading together - but she is so obviously bored by the stories too. When she�s engaged in a story we�re reading it�s the one time she�s still!! In contrast she barely listens when we re-read her favourites or the early chapter books � she�s all over the place, chatting to herself and so on.
I guess my aim is to get back into stories that really capture her imagination.
After your thoughts � is this the wrong approach or should I just stick to my guns and keep borrowing and offering to read new things to her? Any thoughts on how to get her back on board? Any book ideas along the lines of the Famous Five?
Last edited by Giftodd; 05/16/11 02:59 AM.
