In Which Graphic Novels Make My Kid Into a Bookworm (And Count As Real Books)

Over three years ago, I wrote a post lamenting the fact that I was unable to turn my kids into bookworms despite the fact that I did everything the experts say you should do to turn kids into reading. That includes reading to them, modeling reading, taking them to the library often, owning a lot of books, letting them choose books they read, and more.

Since that post, Squirrelboy, who is now a senior in high school, has basically stopped reading or listening to books for pleasure. I think a large part of the reason for this is that he is now taking dual credit classes at the local community college and he has to do a lot of reading for school. His dyslexic brain doesn't have a lot of energy left to read for pleasure after that. He doesn't listen to audiobooks much anymore, either. He prefers short form listening, he says. He listens to a lot of podcasts. I'm hoping he'll rediscover reading or listening to books for pleasure at some point during adulthood. 

Kittygirl, meanwhile, has turned into a regular bookworm. She does still prefer spending time with people, but she doesn't have to exhaust every other option before turning to a book. When we go to the library, she usually comes out with a huge pile of books and reads one of them on the way home. She sometimes even chooses reading a book over interacting with people.

So what turned the tide for her? Graphic novels are what did it. She is obsessed with graphic novels. She's still a picky reader. With a few notable exceptions, she reads realistic fiction graphic novels. Every once in awhile she crosses into fantasy, but she doesn't like most fantasy graphic novels. She's also picky about the style of art. She's turned down some books I thought she would like because she doesn't like the style of art.

There are a lot of graphic novels of the style she likes, but she would have run out of reading material long ago if she weren't a re-reader. She's read many of her favorite books dozens of times. This year, for Christmas she asked mostly for graphic novels.

As you can see, her Christmas wishes came true.

Kittygirl is still classed as an advanced reader. On tests, her reading level is past high school. Her teachers encourage her to read closer to her grade level, and she'll do it if she has to, but she prefers to read the graphic novels that she loves. Since her reading level goes up on every test, it doesn't seem to be hurting her.

Kittygirl has a lot of friends whose parents don't think graphic novels are "real books". I can understand their hesitation in a way. It did take me awhile to warm up to graphic novels. But when you tell your kids they can't read the books they want to read, what you usually end up with is not a kid who loves to read high quality literature but rather a kid who hates reading. I've seen this happen to quite a few kids in my circle now that my youngest has reached middle school.

So what's the lesson here? Let your kids read what they want to read, even if they're books you don't like. This is much more likely to result in the loving books long term. But also, if you do everything right, it's not a foolproof formula to "raise a reader".