Tuesday, March 3, 2009

Survey: Three quarters of parents are too busy to read to their kids

Now, granted, the survey was conducted by a British company that's trying to drum up enthusiasm for reading, but still, the results are kind of shocking to me: A study of 2,000 British parents found that three-quarters of them were too busy -- or too tired -- to read to their young kids at bedtime.

It's been years since I read out loud to my older kids, but they're 15, 13, and 10 -- plenty old enough to read to themselves. (I know some parents would disagree, pointing out that reading out loud is for any age child, and for them I have two things to say: 1.) If I don't encourage them to read to themselves, how will they ever develop strong reading skills and 2.) I work full time, they're teens and tweens, it's OK to pass the torch on this one.) But either I or my husband read to our 4- and 2-year-olds every night, plus a few times during the day if we're all home.

Too busy to read a couple of board books? Really?

What do you think? Sound off here or in the comments section at the Boston.com Child Caring blog.

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