Lay Your Children Down By Reading A Book, Not Watching Television

There is nothing quite as therapeutic and comforting as getting a child to fall asleep while we read a book to him. The listening experience is also fundamental for your mastery of reading. Furthermore, through our voice we take our children to a fantasy and adventure universe where their brain finds calm and the invitation to continue dreaming happily while they sleep.

Francesco Tonucci is a noted Italian pedagogue who has based all his work on the study of young children’s cognitive development. For him, something as simple as turning off the television and reading a book to our children is creating tomorrow’s great readers. Furthermore, it implies bringing them closer to a value that will make them free, more curious and certainly worthy heirs of the legacy that good books leave us.

While it’s true that we are sometimes tired and that it’s easier to gather in front of the television in the last hours of the day, think that your children’s childhood is very brief, and the best time is “always now”. Enjoy every second and every moment, make them your accomplices in front of a book, let sleep win them in your lap as you reach the end of this story. Tomorrow they will thank you…

An open book is a brain that speaks and a mind that listens

One of the problems we usually have with children when it comes to reading is that many approach books out of school obligation and not for pleasure. This shouldn’t be like this. The good reader first approaches these oceans of letters in his childhood out of sheer curiosity and subtle challenge.

Something as simple as giving children the freedom to choose their reading is something that always brings good results, but it’s even better when we act as a role model. In fact, for Tonucci, there is no better toy than a book and there is no greater success than favoring children’s ability to listen by listening to us read.

To understand this better, we invite you to consider these aspects to reflect on.

The benefits of relaxed reading

Thanks to work conducted by the “American Academy of Pediatrics” an important discovery was made: children between the ages of 2 and 6 should not be exposed to television or electronic devices for more than an hour a day. From 7 to 12 years of age, we should ensure that they do not exceed 2 hours.

According to this study, prolonged television or computer viewing can develop an attention deficit in little ones. This is due to the fact that the frontal cortex, which is still immature in children, is super activated by electromagnetic waves.

Letting our kids sleep while watching television isn’t precisely the most therapeutic thing, even though we often do it ourselves. We talk about education, pedagogy and, above all, children’s health, so before letting sleep take you in front of the TV or tablet, it is necessary to put into practice the good art of relaxed reading.

• It doesn’t matter that your children have not yet acquired the skills of reading and writing or that they are already making their first achievements. Sitting down with them in bed and starting to read to them will be of enormous benefit to their neuronal and emotional development.
• Relaxed reading increases blood flow to the brain, brings well-being to the child and a very gratifying calm appropriate for this last moment of the day.
• The area of ​​the brain that is most stimulated in the “listening” process is the prefrontal area, essential to develop and enhance many cognitive processes in children : attention, imagination and more complex reasoning.

Reading to your children a story or book with an exemplary message or good moral reasoning can enhance your empathy and respect for your peers. It is worth it.

Relaxed reading, a bond of affection between fathers, mothers and children

Read to your children without thinking that you are wasting time or that you have too much to do besides that. Allow time to stop and grab them, let the emotion of this book envelop you and let your voice capture your child’s heart.

No gift can surpass these moments of shared reading, in these invented places where dreams, adventures and mysteries speed up your imagination while your breathing gradually and slowly gains pace, as sleep arrives and you simply surrender .

Relaxed reading in the last hour of the day is a wonderful way to educate your minds and allow your brain to mature in balance. Books are a legacy shared between parents and children, and nothing should replace them, least of all television or new technologies.