What can I do to help my son pay attention when I read to him?

Question

My son is 3 years old (turning 4 in one month), and because of my fault, I haven't read to him much since he turned about 1 years old :( Please don't give me grief about this....

I know how important reading is, so here lately, I have been trying to read to my son almost every night but he just will not listen to me. He will talk about the pictures in the book instead of listening or he gets bored before I even finish reading the book and he will get up and leave. Sometimes, I will catch him looking at something else in the room or start to play with his toys.

Will I need to give him time??... Anyone have any suggestions as to what I can do to help him pay attention more or how I can get him more interested?? It's about time that he starts learning to read himself, I want to help him in any way that I can...

Thanks! :)

Answer 1

Let him pick the books he wants to hear. Also, three is a little young to start reading, but you should encourage to like it for when he is old enough. Talking about the pictures is getting involved.

Another way is to pay attention to how you're reading. If your voice is dull, or if you're going too fast, he won't be able to follow and will get bored. Remember to be just as involved as you want him to be.

Read to him someplace comfortable and familiar. If he's umcomfortable he won't want to stay.

Make it fun. Use special voices. It's you and him time, so it's something important.

Answer 2

Hi.

It sounds to me like you need to take a few steps back from reading.  (We get children involved in literacy skills too early anyhow!)

You need to develop his attentional skills and the way to do this is to go back to the begining.  Visual games, which encourage purposeful eye contact and which encourage the sharing of attention are useful.  These will teach him how to regulate his attention within an interaction and teach him how interaction works, (that it is a two - way thing and he must listen instead of purely transmitting).

If you begin there and then begin to get him interested in and sensitive to the sound system of language by playing games around rhyme and alliteration you will then be on the right track.  Only then, when he has developed the ability to regulate his attention and he has an appreciation of the sound system of English, will he be ready to be introduced into reading.

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Answer 3

Go to the library and get a ton of different books and experiment.  As soon as he loses interest in one, try a different one.  My son loves books, but I've learned which ones to get.  If I get one with too many words on a page, or pictures that are too pastelly, he's not interested.  Look for trucks if he likes trucks, dinosaurs if he likes dinosaurs, flap books if he likes opening flaps, pop-ups if he likes those.  Even if they seem very similar to you (we have gotten a dozen different color books and baby animal books from the library) if you keep getting different ones that are within the types he likes, he will probably listen.  And keep the reading sessions short.  There is nothing wrong with talking about the pictures in the book instead of listening: try to tell the story in your own words.  It's probaby a sign that the book's words are too hard or complicated and that you need something a little simpler.  But it's still giving him a senses of the experience of looking through a book and figuring out what the story is.  Also, see if your library has a preschool story hour you can take him to.  When he sees all the other kids interested, that could help, and if you see him listening to a particular book, you can check it out afterwards, which will help you pick something he likes.

Answer 4

My son sometimes has a hard time listening to books.  It depends on his mood.  One thing that has helped lately though is letting him choose the book.  He just turned two and knows by looking at the book if he wants me to read it to him.  When he's not in the mood, I try books with few words, ones where we have to find things in the pictures.  He seems to like those because he likes to show me all the things he knows.

Time will help, but also maybe letting him be a little bit more involved in the books might too.  Try to get books to read about things his is interested in.  

My son was interested in Blue's Clues and Thomas the Train for a while, still is, when we read those books, he pays more attention.  For the books that have a lot to say on each page, if he's not wanting to sit still I just read the first sentence of each page to get through it faster to keep his attention.  Once I have his attention, I read more.

Good luck and have fun with it...Oh yeah, try reading it in an animated way and involve him in reading it.

Answer 5

My son is 5 and still has trouble paying attention.  Have him pick out the book, make sure all distractions are gone and make the book interesting, make your voice change with the characters and make the suspense parts have ALOT of suspense.. just over exadurate the book, also get the books that make them interact, my son is obsessed with this annoying dora book, it makes him count and find things.. he makes me read it almost everynight but it taught him how to count to 10 in spanish!  Just make the book fun, and if he still isnt interested dont force him to listen.. if he feels like fiddeling with his thumbs or buttons on his clothes let him, just kee on reading like you are really enjoying it,      take him to the store and have him pick out books.   GL

Answer 6

Does he get to pick out his own books? That might keep him interested. How about an incentive chart? If he sits through the book, maybe he gets a bed time snack or something. I also like to discuss the pictures in the books anyways, I think it helps grab their attention in between pages.

Oh, almost forgot, does your local library have a summer reading program? We have one here where I live, and the kids get prizes for books that they finish. If they get 100 pts, they can get local water park passes and such.

Answer 7

My daughter is 2 and she is mostly interested in tearing books up. She loves looking at books but doesn't seem to have the patience to sit there and listen. I let her pick out the books and we mostly talk about the pictures. If we're looking at an animal book, I'll ask her what the different animals are and then we make animal noises at one another. I just try to make it fun. I also give her books to look at in her crib at bedtime.

Answer 8

he might have ADD or ADHD

Answer 9

You have a long time before it will be getting to be time for him to start to learn to read on his own. Really you do so ease up on the pressure it sounds like you are putting on yourself and probably on him as well. It's no big deal that you didn't read to him that much -- you can easily make up for it. Reading needs to be enjoyable for you and for him. It should not be a chore and he will certainly pick up on the tension and the negativity and that will absolutely work against what you are trying to accomplish. I don't know what books you've read to him but one of the things you can definitely try is to find books that he shows an interest in. Like if he particularly likes motorcycles or dinosaurs or skyscrapers or whatever it is -- find books on that subject and enjoy looking at them together and talking about the subject. Reading the same book over and over again is perfectly fine. The books don't need to be long or have much of a story. Reading something to him is all that matters and it pretty much doesn't matter what you read to him -- as long as the experience is a positive one. Keep the interaction light -- read to him when he wants you to and not when he doesn't want to be read to. Get books about characters from tv shows that he knows and likes (not what I would ideally recommend, but that's the point). Get books that come with toys attached to them! There's no reason to think that he needs any sort of "help" in the reading department at this point. He is definitely young enough that all you need to do is read to him and make it enjoyable and do it often and he will be fine when it comes time to be ready to learn to read.

Answer 10

I would start with short books about things he loves.  It doesn't matter if you think it is too young for him.  Ask lots of questions while you are reading to him.  Let him try to predict what will happen next, or change the ending of the story when it's over.  Just keep it up and I'm sure he will come around.  Good luck

Answer 11

tips:

1) Before you read a book, look at the cover together and talk about it.  Ask him what he thinks the book might be about, teach him things that might be important to know in the story, give him things to look for such as "try to find a hidden spider on each page, look for the page with a fire truck, etc".   If you are preparing him for a book and he doesn't seem interested at all, choose a different book.  At first you might have to go through a whole pile of twenty library books  before one sparks his interest, but after you figure out his style it will be easier.

2) I've noticed that in general boys are slower to choose complex books than girls.  When I read to boys age 3 they almost always choose the board books I have set aside for my babies.  I'd rather read books with more words, but the key is to read SOMETHING and if they want little board books, go with it.  They are still learning even if it is a "baby" book.  They will choose longer books when they are ready.

3) If a book has too many words or the story is too complex, I simplify the book or even just discuss the pictures on each page.  I start by just discussing pictures so the child has a fun "reading" time, as they get used to reading books you can gradually add more and more words per page.  It took years before I was reading ALL the words to some of my children's favorite books and others were fine as-written.

4) Funny voices.  Always use interesting voices for your characters.  If this doesn't come naturally practice.  Being able to read stories with several different character voices and fun sound effects is a priceless tool for teaching your child to love reading.

Answer 12

let him turn the pages and talk to him about what is going on in the pictures. pick books with characters that he is into

Answer 13

Maybe you could try doing a book that has pop-ups or an activity on the page or textures on the page. It will give him something to do and he will still be focused on the book.

Answer 14

Pick books YOU like!  Read them to YOURSELF as though he weren't in the room.  Try the Harry Potter books! It sounds to me like he's bored...give him some REAL meat to chew! Good luck and God Bless!

Answer 15

My son loved picture books at this age. His favorite was a book called "Wil's Mammoth". Maybe you could try this for now, and ask him to tell the story, and ask him questions about the pictures. After a while, add books with a small amount of words, like "Where the Wild Things Are", and "Life Doesn't Frighten Me at All". That last one has pictures by artist Jean-Michel Basquiat, and words by Maya Angelou .

Answer 16

Its ok if he just wants to talk about the pictures.  Go along with what he wants.  Its important that you get him hooked by going his way, soon you can read pieces of the story as you go along.  Go to the library and have him pick his own books with his own library card.  Check with your local library or book store "story time".  They tell stories using puppets and books.

I also notice with my son when I let him watch too much tv thats all he wants to do and looses interest in reading.  So  I cut down tv time to only the weekeneds and so far this has helped bring him back to books.

Reading is a process and its important to let children use books how ever they want and gradually tell him how to use them by showing them and reading yourself.

Answer 17

I would say much of the same thing. Pick a book you like to read and when he sees your interested he'll be interested. I have read the Harry Potter books to my son and he loves them. I am also currently reading Twilight by Stephenie Meyers. I explained to my son that's it's about vampires and I find he is more interested in what I'm reading than picture books.