How to Get Boys to Read: It's the Technology, Stupid!

How to Get Boys to Read: It's the Technology, Stupid!

Is your son or grandson is a reluctant reader? Is he spending too much time texting, playing video games, and watching TV? You're not alone, but you might consider steering him toward audiobooks or E-books. It worked for us. Way back when our son was small, I taped The Lord of the Rings and Star Wars, both BBC radio productions, so he could listen to them on his tape player in his room and, hopefully, would eventually fall asleep. He's grown now, but he's always been an avid reader, and I attribute at least part of the reason to his early introduction to these books on tape.

Now of course, audiobooks are everywhere, and publishers are putting more and more titles on CDs and in both iTunes and MP3 formats, which makes them even more convenient and more importantly cool. I'm addicted to audiobooks myself. I listen while driving (I started with Books on Tape, moved to CDs, now I'm into MP3), and I'm guessing they will gain as much traction with young boys and teenagers as E-readers like Amazon's Kindle, Barnes & Noble's Nook, and, Apple's iPhones, which as you already know are everywhere.

In fact, no less a source than The New York Times wrote about this phenomenon recently: E-Readers Catch Younger Eyes and Go in Backpacks (by Julie Bosman, Feb. 4, 2011). In that article book publishers say 20-25% of their sales are generated by E-books, up from single digits last year. And parents are saying: The kids are already using the platforms (Computers, iPhones, Kindles, etc.), so let's use them to help kids learn and become better and avid readers. Teachers are also allowing them in class. Hey, it's one way to get boys to use their iPods for something other than music. (Note: It may help to tell him no one will even know he's listening to a book.)

Of course, the first step to get your son or grandson reading is to make great audiobooks and E-books available to him. Most of the books on my website, http://boysbestbooks.com, are available as audiobooks or in electronic format for E-readers. But audiobooks really are like the radio plays of "yesteryear," as the announcer used to say on The Lone Ranger, and the quality varies from book to book and publisher to publisher. Some readers are fabulous I put Jim Dale, who did such a masterful job with the Harry Potter audiobooks, in that category. But if you want to know the best of the latest crop of audiobooks, check out the 2011 Odyssey Awards for best audiobook for children and teens, offered by the Assn. for Library Service to Children (ALSC). I've culled that list for books of interest to boys and added it to my blog, which you can access at http://boysbestbooks.com/b3-blog/, and I've created a special "Audiobook" page on my web site. Soon, I'll be offering a list of best audiobooks for pre-schoolers. So, if you're tearing your hair out to find some way to get your son or grandson reading, remember: "It's the technology, stupid!"

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