I am going to be a mother who reads with her children because I think that reading with my child will develop emotional connections. Ann Moulton Johnson captures the idea beautifully in her article I Had a Mother Who Read to Me when she says, “Reading together is one of the few activities a family can participate in that involves no expense. Instead of working and worrying to provide your children with material possessions that are soon broken and forgotten, try giving them time and love. Memories are made of these magic ingredients.” (Johnson 76). The beauty of reading as a family is that it takes time and energy and I want my children to know that I love them so much I am willing to give up both to be with them. There could not be a better way to sacrefice time and energy than to read with my children.
When I read with my children I will be able to convey the meaning of values and morals to my children. A study how parents read with their children notes, “the belief that parents teach more than the mechanisms and strategies of reading during storybook activity with their children; rather, they convey their worldviews and values based on previous experiences.” (Neuman, 498). I think that my values and views will be conveyed by the books that I chose to read with my children, and my voice when I read.
The books I chose to read with my children will affect the books that they chose to read on their own. Not only will I want to read books that are age aproprate, but I want to be informed on the messages in the books. I remember that my mom would read The Magic Tree House or The Great Brain, and she did not like Goosebumps. To this day I have never read a Goosebumps book and I believe that it was because my mom did not read them to us. Understand, I am not saying that Goosebumps are a horrible series. I do not even think myself qualified to make that judgement because I have never read them, but what I am saying is that I was influenced by the books that my mother chose to read to me. The books that I chose and chose not to read to my children will have a simular influence.
I like to imagine that how I read a story to my child has the same affect that good music has in a movie. When I watch a movie I know when the character is not supposed to open the door not because I know what is behind the door, but because the music is so intense in the movie that there has to be something coming. Just like music brings the movie to life how I read will bring the characters to life. For example my niece makes sure that every time I read What does This Animal Say? that I oink like a real ping. How I read to my children can do more than just maintain interest, but I think that how I read such sentences like, “he has a sad face,” or “he ate and ate and then he had a tummy ache.” Will teach my children how I feel in these situations. Children can match a parent’s happy voice and face by the time they are six months old (Flavell). I want to read to my children with voices, energy and rythem because I how I read will influence how they feel and think about what I am reading.
There are many oportunites for children to learn to read in classrooms, in preschool, with teachers, but I think that parents are encouraged to read with their child for more than just cognitive development. The books that I chose to read with my children and how I read to my children will greatly influence the morals and views that they develop. Money can send children to the best school, private tutors can drill children in the most rigorious manner, but nothing can teach a child how much their parents love them as spending time with them.
It is one of the most stereotypical sociology studies: give a child one M&M and tell them when you come back if they have not eaten the M&M they will get three more. I remember when I was in Jr. High and I came home from my sociology class and told my mom about the test. She smiled and said, “You waited until I got back to eat the marshmallow when I tried that test with you.” In Jr. High I felt puzzled by how pleased she seemed that I passed such a strange test, but now that I have begun to feel the pressure of college exams I can understand how vital it is that children understand how to delay gratification. I want my children to understand the importance of delaying gratification and I want to develop this understanding by talking to my children about their potential and by being an example of setting and obtaining goals myself.
It is possible that, “The nature of this future-oriented self-control, which develops over time and then coexists with more impetuous behaviors, has intrigued students of development, who have made it central in theories of socialization and in the very definition of the “self” (Elster, 148). If someone cannot comprehend that they are an individual in the present moment, how could that person ever comprehend the idea of who they will be in the future? I want my children to know that they are an individual and I hope that by helping them to recognize that they are an individual that they will begin to set goals for themselves. I think that part of helping my child to discover who they are is to talk about them with them to help encourage private speech (Berk). I want to asking questions like; “How come you liked soccer practice so much today?”, “What did you learn in school today?”, and “Why did you enjoy Grandma’s house?” to help my children explore private speech. By doing this I hope that they will begin to develop a sense of identity.
I think that it is important that my children assets their own skill level and set their own individual goals. In a study done on sixth-grade children who struggled with math the children who set their own performance goals had higher self-efficacy than the children who had goals set for them and the children who had no goals at all. (Schunk) I want my children to set their own goals, because it is important to me that they learn how to delay their gratification and put what they desire in the future above their initial wants. I want my children to be aware of who they are now and who they want to become so that goal setting can be introspective and help them to learn to develop themselves and not a matter of outward performance or judgmental comparisons to their peers. As a parent I can only rely on my child’s grade accomplishments or what I believe is their ability level, but my child can rely on their own self-efficacy beliefs and my aspirations when they set goals for themselves. (Autumn, Pages 663-676). I want my children learn to develop themselves and that is why I want them to begin setting goals in minor areas such as academics, athletics, diet, and performance.
To help my children place value on high morals and positive social interaction I need to model delayed gratification. The strongest influence on what my children will value is the values that I model in my behavior. (Whitbeck, Les B. page 829). I want my children to have high moral values. Children learn to value even such simple things as food. In obese children they struggle with delaying their gratification for food related items possibly because of the strong value of food in their lives. (Bonanto, Boland)
Children who can learn to delay gratification have been shown to be better able to control their ego tendencies and are considered more socially adapt. (Funder, Block, Block) That is the type of children I want raise.
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