'Mirror' Stories: Reflecting Real Life

 

            Kids in the early primary years love fantasy, but they also love seeing how the stories in books are similar to what's going on in their everyday lives.

 

            So when you go to the library, or suggest books as gifts from Grandma or for birthdays, be thinking of what's going on at your house. A good children's librarian or bookstore employee will know just the right book to connect the dots in an enjoyable way for your youngster.

 

            Let's say you just got a white dog with black spots. Your child will roar at the antics of "Harry, the Dirty Dog," who got so dirty his family didn't recognize him and thought he was a black dog with white spots!

 

            Maybe there's a big road construction project going on near your house. Your child might like "Mike Mulligan and the Steam Shovel," the beloved tale of a bulldozer who could do a tremendous amount of work in just one day.

 

            If your family just returned from a vacation elsewhere in the United States, you could expand your child's understanding of that region or its history with a book that you could read aloud when you return home. Try "Little House on the Prairie" for a child who has just seen farmland for the first time, or "Misty of Chincoteague" after a visit to the Outer Banks of the mid-Atlantic seaboard.

 

            Cultivate friendships with teachers, librarians and bookstore personnel so that when something important happens in your child's life - the remarriage of a parent, the death of a relative, a move, a problem at school - you can get a referral to a book that can really make a difference in your child's life.

 

            Make a difference! Because isn't that what reading is supposed to be all about?