How to Beat the “Summer Slide”
Top No-Stress Ways to Keep your Teen Reading during summer break
When kids are in elementary school, summer reading is all about bright, colorful charts, sticker rewards, and library story hours. But once your child hits middle or high school, those tried-and-true tricks seem to stop working overnight. Between summer jobs, team sports, spending time with friends, and the oh-so-magnetic (and devious) pull of TikTok, getting a teenager to pick up a book can feel like an uphill battle.
The academic “summer slide,” is a well-documented thing, but trying to force your kid to embrace a reading list will usually just cause friction. The goal during their summer break isn’t to recreate their English class, it’s to introduce a low-pressure habit to help develop a better vocabulary, improve critical thinking, stay sharp mentally, and dare we say, establish reading as being an activity that’s actually fun?
With that in mind, we’ve put together the top realistic tips to help you encourage your teen (or pre-teen) to read over summer break.
Broaden your own definition of “reading”
If your teen rejects traditional novels, don’t stress. Literacy comes in many formats, and each one helps develop different literacy-related skills. Graphic novels and manga require complex visual literacy and narrative tracking. Studies have shown that when someone consumes media in those formats, it activates more of the brain than standard reading alone, as you’re consuming words and images at once. Ultimately, any time spent engaging with text, regardless of the format, is a win for you both.
Test Out the Book To Screen Pipeline
Instead of leaving your old copies of Pride & Prejudice or George Orwell’s 1984* lying around and seeing if they’ll take the bait, try using Hollywood to your advantage. A cynic might say there’s a startling deficit of original ideas to be found in movies and tv shows these days, but that fact can actually work to your advantage. With so many popular streaming series and films being adapted from YA novels or biographies, it creates the opportunity for you to make a deal with your teen: if they read the book, you’ll host a movie night to watch the adaptation together. (Bonus: Comparing how a director chose to translate the main character or interpret a plot point will naturally set them up to think critically about the text).
*Yes, we know there are film adaptations for both of these.Depending on your teen however, it might be a bit of an uphill battle to get them on board with this selection.
Embrace Audiobooks
Listen (see what we did there?), we know that recommending audiobooks could also just as easily fall into the “Broaden Your Definition of Reading” tip, but hear us out (ok that one was on purpose). When you listen to a story, it activates the same comprehension and language processing centers in the brain as traditional reading. Audiobooks can be an incredible tool for reluctant readers, and can even help expose them to more advanced vocabulary than they might otherwise read.
Bonus: If you’re looking for a way to access a ton of audiobooks for the low, low price of FREE, check out your local library! By signing your family up as card-carrying members of the local library, you’ll have on-demand access to thousands of audiobooks (as well as countless other resources). Check out our recent blog post on the subject to learn more.
Move from “did you read?” to “What do you think?”
Instead of treating reading like a chore to log on a timer, treat your teen like an equal conversational partner. Ask open-ended questions, and instead of using ones that feel like a quiz (“What happened in chapter 3?”) try these conversation starters instead:
If you wrote the ending, how would you finish it?
Do you think the main character is making smart choices?
What would you do if you were dropped into the world where this story takes place?
Interested in learning more about all the incredible resources offered by local libraries? Click the link below!