Help Kids Have Fun Reading and Writing with Interactive Books

Parents who help children develop a love of reading when they are young are putting kids on a path to school success and lifelong achievement. Figuring out how to motivate young children to read is important. The Reading Is Fundamental program encourages parents to keep books and reading materials in the home and to try “hands-on” activities to stimulate reading.

Children’s book author K.A. (Kathy) Bye says, “The more a child is engaged in a book, the better chance the child will become a reader.” She has created four interactive books that let children be a part of the thinking, writing, and illustrating process.

My Trip to the Zoo, Visiting My Grandmother, I Like Birthdays, and I Like Holidays allow kids to create a personal story by completing the pages using their own words, photographs, and drawings. The books let parents and children have fun together while capturing special childhood moments and reliving them by reading the keepsake books again and again.

The books help children, ages 3 to 8, practice reading, writing and concepts such as colors, sizes, numbers, calendar days and social skills they need to learn in kindergarten and early elementary grades. For younger children, the books are a pre-reading exercise allowing them to color while an adult fills in the sentences; older children enjoy writing the story themselves.

“Working on the books together can give parents unique insights into their child, as well as bringing them together,” says Bye.

The books are available from the Boys Town Press 1-800-282-6657, www.boystownpress.org, and at bookstores.