In education, if you want your child to accept something, you tempt him; if you want him to reject something, you force him - this is a very effective trick. Parents who fail to achieve their goals and do not do what they want must be using the opposite method.
When Yuan Yuan was in the second grade, I felt that her literacy and reading level had the potential to go to the next level, so I suggested that she read long novels. Yuan Yuan's first reaction to this suggestion was disbelief.
She had often seen me read novels that were so thick, with so many words and basically no illustrations. She instinctively felt that long novels were difficult and uninteresting to read, and could only be read by adults. The books she had read before this were all picture-based children's books. I understood her difficulty and didn't say anything else.
Considering that the novels on my bookshelf were not too suitable for her at that time, I went to buy Jin Yong's "Yitian Tu Long Ji". I had never read any of Jin Yong's novels before, but had only seen the TV series adapted from his novels. I guessed from the TV series that the novel also had charm and should be able to be enjoyed by children. I didn't tell Yuan Yuan that I bought it so she could read it, and like any novel I usually get back for myself, I went to read it myself after I finished my work.
That book is really good-looking, there are a lot of suspense, I read every day after a passing praise that this book is very good, and then intentionally or unintentionally to tell some of the plot to Yuan Yuan listen, to talk about the fascinating when you say I am reading here, the back still do not know it, and then finish reading to tell you.
This several times, tickled Yuan Yuan's heart, see her anxious, I will push the boat and say either you read it yourself, Mom does not have time to read so much at once. I said, "It doesn't matter if you don't know the words, just read the general meaning and ask your mother which words affect your understanding. When she heard me say that, she started to try to read.
Reading is not a difficult process to get into. The important thing is to let your child pick up a book without fear and start reading it. When she read more than the part I read, I often pretended not to have time to read, and acted anxious to know how someone later, so that she saw the plot to tell me, and talk with her about the interesting people and things in this. This made Yuan Yuan more and more interested in reading, and by the end of the book, she began to have confidence in her reading ability.
After reading the book, Yuan Yuan and I read the preface of the book together and learned that Jin Yong wrote a total of fourteen martial arts novels, taking the first word of each part to form a couplet: "Flying Snow Shooting White Deer, Laughing Book of Divine Warrior Leaning on Bi Yuanyuan". Such beautiful words also gave Yuan Yuan curiosity, she said she still wanted to read Jin Yong's novels. I said so many books if you buy it is quite expensive, why not rent to see it. So I took her to rent books.
After that, the more she read, the faster she read, and the more she read, the more her interest and ability in reading soon showed a good and stable state. She finished reading all of Jin Yong's martial arts novels in one go. From then on, she discovered the pleasure of reading long novels, and then reading long novels became a very easy task.
A colleague of mine at that time said that her son did not like any reading, not even story books, and seemed to have a fear of reading words, and wrote very poor essays. The mother was very worried about this. She knew that Yuan Yuan reads a lot of books, so she especially hoped that her son would get to know Yuan Yuan and be influenced to enjoy reading as well.
One day I led Yuan Yuan to her house to play, her son is a grade higher than Yuan Yuan, was in the fifth grade, see we came very happy.
As soon as we sat down, my colleague said to her son, "Look, Yuan Yuan is two years younger than you, but he has read a lot of books, you should also read more books in the future, not just play all day.
This contrast made the little boy look embarrassed.
I quickly let the two children go to another room to play, and then reminded my colleague that he should not talk about the children in this way to outsiders, as this would make the children feel less confident about reading and feel very humiliated. Children are actually very respectful, and if you want them to do something, you should appropriately show your appreciation for that to outsiders.
I also reminded her that if you want your child to enjoy reading outside of school, don't ask him to "read" directly, and don't always use his love of reading as a topic of conversation, or lecture him about reading.
I then told her how I "tempted" Yuan Yuan to read a novel, thinking she should be able to learn something from it.
When we left, the boy also came out to see us off. His mother, perhaps out of politeness, said to her son, "Look, Yuan Yuan has finished reading all of Jin Yong's novels, I'll rent you a few to read later. The boy nodded his head somewhat hesitantly.
I vaguely feel that she said this is still not quite right. She is actually still using a child's strong, compared to another child weak, and her words are too clear, too purposeful, did not leave a little room for "temptation".
Later, this colleague told me with a sigh that she had rented Jin Yong's books, but her son just wouldn't read them, reading three pages of a book for three days and then refusing to read any further.
I had to tell her frankly that you have found a role model but not a breakthrough to motivate your child, just using the goodness of other children to compare his shortcomings, so you are not impressing your child from the heart. Children read by their interest in reading books. How can a little child read just to not fall behind others and what parents want!
She asked me what to do, and I considered that Jin Yong had already put pressure on the child, so I said, "You should not mention reading novels for the time being, he is so afraid of words, he can only start with the simplest things first. This way, you first subscribe to an evening newspaper, there are some interesting social news on it every day, which everyone loves to read, is the most amusing thing. If you see any interesting news every day, recommend it to your child, not more, one or two a day is enough. Lure him to read the newspaper first, and if he can browse it regularly, he will slowly find reading less scary, and then find a way to get him to read novels.
After a few days, this colleague still shook her head when she saw my face, saying that her son wouldn't even read the newspaper. I wondered why this child was so saber-rattling about words. After a closer look at the process, I found that the parents' approach was always inept. In this case, it would be strange if the child was willing to read.
It turns out that this colleague bought an evening paper every day after work and handed it to her child when she got home. She also tried to use the "temptation" approach, always told the child, reading the newspaper is good, this newspaper is very good, you should read at least one or two articles; want to read which read which. In order to check whether the child had read or not, she had to ask the child to tell her what she had read every day before she went to bed. After only a few days of reading, the child started to fight with her again for reading the newspaper.
This mother, who always failed to achieve her goal even though she seemed to do everything she was supposed to do each time, said she was simply desperate for her son's reading.
Once again, I had to be honest with her and say that there was a little "temptation" in your actions, but essentially you were still "directing". You make him read at least one or two articles, and you check to see if your child has read them, so that reading the newspaper becomes a "task". You have to put yourself in the child's place and think about it, feel what is called temptation; if you always think from the parent's point of view, it is easy to turn temptation into instructions again and again, and lose the effect again and again.
Not all parents are so set in their ways; many of them, once they understand the importance of reading, can also understand the importance of temptation at the same time and will create some means of temptation. But many of these tactics also tend to fail because the temptation they create is no match for another temptation: the television.
If a child has built up an interest in reading from an early age, he will generally not let the television take away his reading time; but if the child has had little exposure to books and has grown up in front of a television set, it is more difficult and requires the use of more tactics if you want him to start reading halfway.
Parents should never resort to forcibly turning off the TV to get their child to read. Even if the TV is turned off, it is unlikely that the child will willingly pick up a book; even if he does, it is unlikely that he will read with his heart. Some parents have asked me what to do in this situation, and I have given them a "trick" that some people have used with good results.
I suggested that they take off a certain cable from the TV, or take off an accessory, so that the TV does not play properly. Parents pretend that the TV is broken, and then find various excuses to delay the time to repair the TV. It can take as little as a month or two, or as much as six months or a year. During this time, the parents start reading some books, and then recommend an interesting book to the child at the right time, so that he can find the pleasure of reading in the midst of boredom. When the child really starts reading one book after another, then "fix" the TV.
To prevent your child from going back to watching TV endlessly after the TV is "fixed," parents can use this opportunity to set rules about watching TV. And set a good example.
In the rules of watching TV, I think it is better to control the time, but only to specify which programs are better to watch. Once the rules are set, they should be enforced. Parents should not be spoilers, and they should watch less TV and take time to read books, which is a wordless education for children. The core of this is also the temptation not to move, not to have conflict.
Some parents may find this trick a bit "rancid", too troublesome to operate, and not as convenient as just turning off the TV. There are many parents who don't want their children to watch TV, but don't want to restrict their own TV viewing.
More than one mother who heard my suggestion shook her head desperately, saying that she had nothing to do in the evening, so what would she do if she didn't watch TV; or her husband would not agree to this, because he was tired from work and had to come home every day to relax. At times like this, I feel like I'm at my wit's end.
If a parent is capricious, what is the way not to raise a child who is spontaneous. You don't want to tempt your child to read, so you have to let the TV tempt your child to spend time in front of it day after day.
The most difficult thing to resist is "temptation", the most annoying thing is "coercion", adults and children alike. In education, want the child to accept what, to tempt him; want him to refuse what, to force him - this is a very effective trick. Parents who fail to achieve their goals and do not do what they want must be using the opposite method.
Special Tips
If you want your child to enjoy reading outside of school, don't ask him to "read" directly, don't talk about his love of reading, and don't use reading to teach him a lesson.
Parents should never use the method of forcibly turning off the TV to make their children read.
I think it is better to control the TV rules by not specifying the time, but only the programs that you want to watch. Once the rules are set, they should be enforced. Parents should not be spoilers, and they should watch less TV and take time to read some books.