Monthly Archives: April 2011

Why I raid my kids’ bookshelves

I’ve spent so much time lately researching reading picks for my kids, stocking their bookshelves with all sorts of award-winning and popular titles, that when it finally comes time to reading myself, I often end up reading one of the books I’ve carefully chosen for…. my boys.

I was almost ashamed to admit how lost I got in Suzanne Collins’ Hunger Games trilogy. I bought and read all three in a single week. I’ve since read many more great YA titles, with a To-Read list that is growing daily.

Not only do I find them completely engrossing, and wonderful to fall into at the end of a long day, I have also recently realized how helpful it is to my older son to know I have read a book he might have questions about or is struggling with.

He’s recently picked up The Hunger Games, and while he is still only early on in the story, he had a number of questions about the plot that I would not have been able to help with had I not read it myself. Not only was I able to help him through some of the more difficult concepts, but because I had read it and he knew I had enjoyed it, he kept stopping his reading to discuss the storyline. It was so wonderful not only to be reading side by side, but also to be sharing and exchanging different thoughts about a book.

As for my younger guy, he struggles a bit with his book reports. He has a few of them due several times throughout the year, and when I’ve read his books myself, I’m better able to […]

By |April 28th, 2011|Uncategorized|0 Comments
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Can kids ever read TOO much?

Guest post by Alissa Sklar. Alissa Sklar is the mother of 3 daughters, a freelance writer for Montreal Families Magazine and other publications, and an Assistant Professor of Communication Studies at Concordia University in Montreal, Quebec.

My three daughters are voracious readers.

Now that might be a strange way to start a blog on a site linked to encouraging reluctant readers, but stick with me here. My older girls, twins in grade 5, are so immersed in their novels (fantasy adventures and historical fiction are their favorites) that they began reading through every recess period at school, neglecting their friends and not getting the opportunity to blow off steam through physical exercise. The school guidance counselor actually took the exceptional step (with my permission) of actually banning their books at recess. The school was essentially, remarkably, telling them they read TOO MUCH! (Well, at least at the wrong times)! Kind of a new take on book banning, I guess, and in this case, the only kind of book banning I’d ever support.

Except for the kind where they read books walking down stairs. Also a very bad idea (but that’s another blog post.)

My point (and I do have one) is this: when news of their unusual restriction got out, I got some calls from concerned parents of their classmates. What I had done to promote this wonderful love of reading? What had I done right? And by extension, what had they done wrong?

The only answer I could come up with wasn’t particularly helpful to them. Truth is, I didn’t think there was anything these parents neglected or forgot to do. What’s more, I’m not convinced I did anything particularly different or special. We all sang […]

By |April 27th, 2011|Reluctant readers|6 Comments
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I know my keywords, now what?

In my last post about trying to get found online, I talked about some of things you can do to find out what your keywords are.

So, I did that, and found a couple of interesting surprises, new words I did not really know I could be focusing on.

What I’ve learned from my reading so far is that, although the algorithm for how Google ranks pages and websites is complicated (not to mention secret!), two things seem to be important:

  1. Optimizing your pages for your keywords
  2. Quantity and quality of incoming links to your website

The first step is something I can control fairly easily, and is what I am going to focus on first. From what I’ve learned, here are some of the places you want to be sure you use your keywords in order to optimize your website for search engines:

  1. In the filename (URL) – Include keywords in the filename of each page that best describes the content of the web page. For example, do not use a default ‘page1.html’ to name your pages. I am going to ensure I name my landing page to ‘online-reading-log.html’.
  2. The page title – This is very important and often forgotten! Include your keywords in your page titles. I will be including ‘Reading Log’ in my relevant page titles.
  3. First paragraph of your web page – Be sure to include your keywords in the first paragraph of each web page.
  4. Use the Meta Tags. Both ‘keywords’ and ‘description’ Meta tags should include your keywords. These belong in the <head> section of you pages, and look something like this:
    5. <meta name="keywords" content="reading log, reading programs for kids, reading incentive program, kids [...]
By |April 25th, 2011|Getting Found Online|1 Comment
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Get kids reading with an Easter Treasure Hunt!

As a child, Easter was always one of my favorite holidays. We used to spend it with some great family friends in Massachussetts, who happened to have a huge yard on the edge of a forest.

Our parents used to prepare amazing Easter hunts for us, hiding eggs and chocolates all over the place. The fun seemed to last forever!

Living in Montreal, our Easter Sundays are always terribly unpredictable. It can be spring in full-bloom outside, or we might still have snow. Most of the time, it is somewhere in between, lots of mud, mush and melting snow. So great outdoor Easter hunts are often not possible..

But the indoor hunts always seem to be over before they’ve begun! Despite our cunning hiding tactics… :-)

A couple of years ago, I decided to make things a little different to have the fun last a bit longer. I set up an Easter Treasure Hunt, where the kids had to read clues in order to find the hidden goodies in the house. Each clue was hidden with a couple of chocolates/eggs that they could put in their baskets before moving on to the next clue.

The final clue gets hidden with their ‘bigger’ chocolates/baskets, as their final reward. They absolutely loved this, and have asked for one every year since.

As an example, here’s our first clue from our first treasure hunt, leading the kids to the dryer, where the Easter Bunny went to dry off:

Want to try it? You can download mine here, and adapt it as you […]

By |April 16th, 2011|Literacy activities|2 Comments
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Day 2 of Getting Found Online

One thing I may not have mentioned in my first post about getting found online is that I actually have a real job out there that has nothing to do with Reading Rewards, blogging, or anything involving social media.

So those of you expecting any astronomical results in the last 24 hours will be…. well, disappointed.

Remember, my objective is to do at least 1 thing daily to help improve my SEO, measure any results, and post about it here. That way, together, we can see what works (or at least, can work), and what doesn’t.

I’m proud to report that I did one thing I’m very happy about: I’ve identified some of the keywords I need to be targeting. Did you know you needed to do this? Keywords are the search terms people enter into search engines like Google or Bing. So you want to make sure you optimize your site so that it ranks high when people search for relevant terms.

I used the Google Adwords Keyword Suggestion Tool.

It’s great because you can put in some of the search terms you think are relevant and that you’d want to rank highly for, and it will generate an entire list of other terms you might find useful.

I’ve read enough about keywords and search engines to know that there is no point in trying to rank high on single-word keywords such as ‘reading’, for example. It is best to focus on 2 or 3 word keywords that might have less competition.

So I started with “reading rewards”, “reading incentives” and “reading log”

This spat […]

By |April 14th, 2011|Getting Found Online|7 Comments
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Limiting screen time – take 2

The system worked. The deal was simple: boys, you want to watch TV, play your video games, borrow my iPhone, fine. But you have to read, too. At *least* an equal amount of time.  That’s how Reading Rewards was born, and it was a very simple system that worked brilliantly.

They wanted to watch TV, so they had to read. We spent time picking and choosing the right books for them. We started ‘family reading time’ in the evening: every night at 8pm, we all got together in the living room to read together. They started reading more, and the more they read, the more they wanted to read. It was self-fulfilling, and I thought: a-ha! I’ve found the magic formula!

But life got busy again, and we ‘relaxed’ our rules. I started consulting work for clients again, while still trying to work on my website. While I carried on with bedtime stories with my youngest, we started leaving the boys to themselves a bit more. It seemed there was always ‘a favorite show’ they just had to watch, and by the time it was finished, they were too tired to read.

A couple of weeks ago, my younger guy got an iPod touch. At around the same time I realized how much he was struggling with Book 4 in the Harry Potter series, which I discussed here. Between the iPod and all their ‘favorite’ shows, I realized they have not finished a book in weeks (except for those that are for school).

How did this happen? Here I am, working so hard on a website designed to get kids reading, and I’ve […]

By |April 14th, 2011|Reluctant readers|6 Comments
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Adventures in getting found online

It all seems so easy. Everybody out there has great advice about how to get found online, about what one needs to ‘make it’ in the Social Media world.

Here’s where I am, right now, and I am going to be brutally honest.

For the last 2 years, I have been working on my website, developing it until I have a product I am happy with. Hours and hours of thinking, coding, translating have gone in to www.reading-rewards.com, and I now feel I have a lovely product, with a large, hopefully global appeal, that is available in both English and French. What, you haven’t heard about it? This fantastic, revolutionary website that really gets kids reading?

Aha! Therein lies the problem… Nobody really knows it exists. I am getting a few new users daily, most of those from word of mouth. The only way I get ‘found’ on search engines is if somebody is SPECIFICALLY looking for “reading rewards”. But there is so much more to my fantastic product than that. :-)

So, me and my entire team (me, myself and I), are today embarking on our mission of world domination. Ok, maybe not world domination, but that seems so much more exciting than ‘SEO Optimization’. I want people to find my site. I want people to try my product, and give me feedback. If it turns out they don’t like it, fine, but at least I will know it failed not because people didn’t know about it, but because, well… because I got something else wrong. I am really, really, REALLY hoping that does not happen.

So, my lovely readers, I invite you to join me […]

By |April 13th, 2011|Getting Found Online|7 Comments
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Read to Me – Picture Book Challenge

Bedtime stories in our household have generally been daddy’s domain. The boys are now reading on their own, and more interested in their own silent reading than read-alouds, which leaves us with our youngest, now aged 5. I spoke about my challenges with her English here, so lately I’ve taken a particular, personal interest in storytime, determined to expose her to a steady stream of English-language picture books.

Today, I discovered the Read-To-Me Picture Book Challenge, and knew immediately I wanted to take part in it. What a great idea!

I’ve been so focused on Reading Reading and my boys’ reading, that I have to admit I’ve missed out on some special moments with my daughter. I’m thinking this challenge can be our special project. I may have to fight hubby for this, although so far, he seems ok with the fact that I have ‘taken over’ this part of the routine. I think he understands how important it is for me, as an Anglo Montrealer, to have a daughter who speaks English.

I’ve decided to participate at the “Feeding” level (72 picture books in a year), although we do read more than 1-2 books a week. I want to take the time to review and post about the books, so I think this is what I can reasonably manage!

I’ve really enjoyed reading some of the posts that other participants have put up so far, and look forward to sharing some of our favorites here! Will any of you join us?

Happy Reading!

Michelle

By |April 11th, 2011|Reviews|0 Comments
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Great read alouds by Julia Donaldson

Last week, I did something I really should have done ages ago. I sorted through my sons’ bookshelves, trying to make sense of the picture books, encyclopedias, comic books and novels they have been accumulating since…. well, birth.

Some of the obvious ones had already migrated to my daughter’s room ages ago, but lately I’d been having this nagging feeling while searching through her books for our read aloud sessions that some great ones were missing.

How excited I was to find a couple of real treats from Julia Donaldson, collecting dust on the boys’ bottom bookshelf!

George the Giant was the scruffiest giant in town, until he bought himself some new clothes. He then became “The Smartest Giant in Town”. (This generated some conversation with my children for whom ‘smart’ means clever or intelligent. I explained that in England, ‘smart’ also means handsome or well-dressed…)

In this book, George walks through town in his ‘smart’ new clothes and meets all sorts of animals in distress. He helps every one of them by giving them items from his new wardrobe, until he has nothing left but his old rags. But he is happy because he has helped his friends, who, in the end, reward him by naming him ‘The Kindest Giant in Town’. This book, full of lovely, repeating rhymes, fantastically illustrated by Axel Sheffler, teaches a great lesson about helping those in need. My daughter couldn’t believe how George gave his clothes away without a second thought, and giggled seeing him in his various stages of undress. She has asked for it again and again since I ‘found’ it, […]

By |April 10th, 2011|Reviews|11 Comments
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Making reading logs fun!

Many teachers use reading logs in the classroom and as homework assignments to encourage reading and comprehension among their students. But reading logs are often done individually, and cannot easily be shared by fellow students. Kids often complain about them, and they can actually become counter-productive.

Here a few tips on how to make reading logs fun:

  • Use an online reading log program like Reading Rewards. Keep everything centralized, no more lost or forgotten homework!
  • Set daily or weekly reading targets, and reward your students when they reach them. Rewards do not have to be expensive in order to be effective! One male teacher we know of rewarded his students by wearing a dress for a day when his class reached his target! You could also hold a raffle at the end of your reading challenge, and have kids earn a ticket every time they reach their daily reading target. Using the Reading Rewards program, kids earn RR Miles with their reading minutes. Teachers can then set up an ‘RR Store’ for their students, where kids purchase their rewards with their points.  Here are some great examples of rewards teachers have set up:

  • Share your students’ book lists and reviews with the class. Kids enjoy learning about what their classmates are reading, and these can be a great source of book recommendations.
  • Make things a little competitive! Set up a reading race, and see who reaches the finish line first! Have your students ‘advance’ in the race for every 10 minutes of logged reading time. This is a great way to
By |April 6th, 2011|Reluctant readers|0 Comments
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