Comments on: Read to Your Niño!

By: 6 Tips to Boost Your Child’s Bilingual Vocabulary | SpanglishBaby™

6 Tips to Boost Your Child’s Bilingual Vocabulary | SpanglishBaby™ — Mon, 25 Mar 2013 17:44:54 +0000

[...] Read, read and then read some more — Nothing is better for boosting your child’s vocabulary than reading. Read to them out loud. Read to them often. And it doesn’t have to be just books. You can [...]

By: Tracy López

Tracy López — Wed, 13 Jun 2012 17:23:04 +0000

Wow! Fantastic interview. Adriana was being super humble for sure! LOL

By: Bolero

Bolero — Wed, 13 Jun 2012 15:15:55 +0000

Casey, your husband had much first hand experience to draw from his parents in terms of strategies and value in reading to your son. Great to know he is carrying on the family tradition. Indeed, your socioeconomic/class concerns in regards to reading does demonstrate a correlation. Yet, I dare say that there are many immediate things that can be done in the meantime. Strategies for parents, for example, are aspects that can be provided without having to immediately tackle the class divide (which is real and legitimate). Also, I think it’s fair to say that the “reading culture” (reading to children) is not necessarily a value exclusive to middle- upper class folk. Where the discrepancies are found, I believe, are in strategies or first hand knowledge more so than a lack of value. I think Adriana’s campaign, for example, is a wonderful strategy that produces immediate and tangible results.

By: Bolero

Bolero — Wed, 13 Jun 2012 14:47:03 +0000

Tracy, It’s a pleasure to share and contribute. Thanks for paddling along. What we need against that current is a fine tuned motor boat! Ha.

By: Bolero

Bolero — Wed, 13 Jun 2012 14:41:37 +0000

Adriana, I commend the work that you are doing. Indeed, your campaign must deal with many sociological issues. The aspects of authority and gender identification are real and significant challenges. Reading, and particularly to children, does quite likely have a gender tinge. I suspect that there is a perception that reading is a passive interaction that clashes with male self- identification. That may be a source for that misplaced embarassment. In fact, reading is an immensely proactive and empowering action since it actually strengthens parental authority in the aspects of fostering educational expectations for children. Reading to children is a “do as I do” rather than “do as I say” method of promoting learning. Also, if both parents read, I perceive that what is developed is a genuine stance between mom y dad where the child knows that there is no parent to find an out later on when homework or school work is required to be done. Good luck in your efforts Adriana.

By: Ana Flores

Ana Flores — Wed, 13 Jun 2012 05:20:56 +0000

Adriana is being humble! Check her out at the local Univision station introducing her program and reading one of the wonderful bilingual books she wrote, part of the Heritage Languages collection we’re fans of.

http://univisionaustin.univision.com/comunidad/despierta-austin/video/2012-05-30/pedro-y-margarita-lectura-para-padres-y-ninos

By: Ana Flores

Ana Flores — Wed, 13 Jun 2012 05:15:27 +0000

Oh, yes! They do remind you! In fact, tonight we were packing for a cruise vacation we have in a couple of days and the first thing Camila packed into her little suitcase were a set of books (actually the ones from http://HeritageLanguages.com !!) She then turned to me and said: “Ya empaqué los libros para sue tengan qué leerme todas las noches!”

My husband actually started reading to her Dr. Seuss books in Spanish when she was in my belly. We had read somewhere (it must have been BabyCenter!) that since she heard my voice all day, all the time, it was important for the dad to speak directly to the belly when he was around me. It recommended reading since it would make it less awkward for the dad

By: Ana Flores

Ana Flores — Wed, 13 Jun 2012 05:07:12 +0000

Tracy, that´s so interesting what you mention about boys being read by mostly by women and then associating it to be a girl thing. Never thought of it that way!

Juan, I´m also not surprised by the results because It´s the same in my household. First of all, I don´t remember EVER being read to by my dad or grandfathers. My husband does read to our girl every other night (we take turns with the nightly routine), but mostly because it´s part of our routine. I´ve never seen him choose to read a book to her or take her to the library just because.

By: Tracy López

Tracy López — Wed, 13 Jun 2012 03:39:29 +0000

Casey, I agree that socio-economics usually play a huge part in this but it seems that according to one study I linked in the post, that even when you remove that factor, Latinas are statistically still less likely to read to their children than Anglo/Caucasian women. The women surveyed in this study all had children enrolled in Head Start programs, and Head Start is income based.

By: Tracy López

Tracy López — Wed, 13 Jun 2012 03:31:55 +0000

Wow Adriana! That’s really interesting! That’s an awesome campaign – hope it becomes widespread outside of Texas.