How do you get your toddler to enjoy story time?
So, this was going to be a “help!” post, but that’s because I titled it about 3 months ago. So, I’m going to turn it into a story…
About 3 months ago, Mr. Busy was 15 months old, and we were really trying hard to get him to enjoy books & reading. It was sort of a struggle, where we would straddle that fine line between forcing him to sit in our laps and listen, and tricking him into sitting still for a few minutes to listen…
It was a real dilemma — were we going to have the boy who wouldn’t read? Were were going to go straight to TV?
Well, I’ll say that the answer is ‘no’ and it’s all thanks to Thomas The Tank Engine. Yes, those silly words, and those silly characters. At that age, Mr. Busy had already begun his fascination with all things transportation, and the only thing left to close the gap in his reading was for him to find a TTTE book on the shelf.
Overnight, he went from “I don’t want to have anything to do with your silly books” to “Please! Train! Up! Up! Train! Woo Hoo!” which is his way of saying “Dearest Father, Would you mind lifting me into your lap, opening this book, and reading to me?”
Its great. Now he loves books of most kinds. We have a great large format word book with pictures of all kinds of stuff. He loves sitting there identifying things, and having me point at things and name them. His favorites? Orange. Horsey. Banana. Truck! Train! Copter! Airplane! (Fire) Engine!
We actually bout our son a book with the collection of all of the original stories. He loved listening to all of them, and would pick which of the stories that he would want us to read.