Reading stamina

At the beginning of this school year, I attended parent's night to get a sense of what Jake would be doing in 3rd grade.  One thing that really interested me was a concept I had never considered before: reading stamina.

Jake's teacher talked about how most of their mornings are dedicated to reading: a mix of phonics work, independent reading, group work, one-on-one help, language activities, etc.  Then she said that a lot of the focus for independent reading time is to build a child's reading stamina; at the beginning of the year there might be some children who can only read steadily for 5 minutes before being tired or restless or just plain DONE with it.  The goal was to gradually move those kids up until they could read independently for long periods of time.

I never really had to think about this before, as my entire family has serious bookworm tendancies that just rubbed off on Jake. (To illustrate this point, look at this picture of my dad with my oldest sister in like 1960 - totally cracks my sisters and I up.  Because that's who he is: he reads books EVERY DAY, no matter what he's doing.)

But it got me thinking about the kids I work with, and I definitely notice when I'm working with A - my 3rd grade student - that she gets fatigued after about 5 minutes of intense reading.  And THAT got me thinking about the brain.  Do you know your brain uses 1/5 of your energy?!  I found the following at YourAmazingBrain.org:

Your brain consumes a lot of energy - as much as a fifth of all the energy you get from food. Brain scans show that thinking uses up a lot of energy (as revealed by increased blood flow).

Your brain can't store much energy, and because it is tightly enclosed inside your skull, there is a limit to how much blood (and therefore energy) can be supplied to active areas. So thinking hard tires your brain.

You guys, that is FASCINATING!!!!  And it brings to mind The Matthew Effect, which I have written about previously: the more you read, the better you get at reading, thus the more you WANT to read, thus the better you get . . . the same applies for reading stamina.  The more time you spend reading, the more you are training your brain to be able to focus on that activity - thus the longer you'll be able to read, and so on.

Now for the practical part of this blog post: how do you help your child to build reading stamina?  Well if your child is ready to start easy chapter books, the best thing to do is get her hooked on a series.  Book series are great because your child gets attached to the characters and wants to know what they will do next.  The reading level tends to stay consistant within the series, which is actually great - even if it's to the point that your child might be reading BELOW her current potential, the fact that she's reading for long periods of time - and most importantly, that she's ENJOYING herself - more than makes up for the lack of a "challenge."

Here's a break-down of chapter book levels, and here are some of the early chapter book series Jake or his friends have enjoyed:
- Flat Stanley
- Black Lagoon Adventures
- Bad Kitty
- Magic Tree House
- Nancy Drew and the Clue Crew
- Captain Underpants
- Junie B. Jones
- Katie Kazoo
- Diary of a Wimpy Kid
- Horrible Harry
- A to Z Mysteries