The UAE declared 2016 the Year of Reading and now we only have a couple more months before the year comes to a close. How have we enriched the lives of our children with books? We need to sit and ask ourselves the question. Did we sit as a family with a book in hand? Did we read a nice book to our little ones? We as parents need to get involved and bring the passion in our children to read books.

Books not only evoke the imagination, they also take us to a different world all together. A child enhances his or her reading skills, vocabulary and understanding of situations. Stories can be hundreds of years old, but they have a hidden meaning that we need to make our children understand. Whenever we are reading a book to them, we need to share with them our thoughts and encourage the children to put forward their thoughts or what they understood from the story.

Lessons learnt from storybooks stay with children. The story of Little Red Riding Hood teaches children about stranger danger. Hansel and Gretel might teach them about presence of mind. We need to derive positive messages from each story and bring it forward and teach children the value of those. The little hardworking hen, who did everything by herself had a nice fresh loaf of bread to eat in the end. If other animals had helped her, the work could have been collaborative and everyone would have had a share of the bread. We as a family need to inculcate the habit of reading books and teaching children to decipher the meaning and imbibing that in their life in a positive way.

Teaching children to read books at a young age will build their curiosity to go to libraries and read more books. The UAE is doing so much for helping our future become more enriching with books. The recently launched scheme to order books at home is one such brilliant effort in this direction.

The great leaders of this country very well understand that wisdom comes from knowledge and knowledge comes from reading, exploring and analysing what we understand. One of the best ways to understand the world around us is to read regularly. Little children are always looking to explore. What better way to make them busy in a good way then to gift them a good book. The weather is starting to get pleasant, we can sit with a book on the beach or in the park or a cafe for that matter.

Books are a great way to start a conversation, so many book clubs have evolved in the UAE. We can socialise and discuss a book with like-minded people. We need to understand that we do live in the digital age, but books should be around us to satisfy the appetite of our ever curious mind.

source : gulfnews