Last Updated on December 8, 2023 by The Smetz Files
In this post I write about the importance of rereading your child’s favorite book.
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As I scrolled social media this week I saw lots of kids and schools celebrating Read Across America Week in honor of Dr. Seuss’ birthday. It’s a delight to see communities engage with schools as guest readers, dressing up as book characters, and celebrating learning to read. It got me thinking about favorite books I read to my classes and my kids.
Childhood Favorite
Do you remember the one book you read possibly a thousand times to your kids when they were young? For G it was Little Blue Truck Leads the Way by Alice Schertle.
He reached for it every night when he was three years old and Jay and I dutifully read it as part of his bedtime routine. He quickly picked up on the predictable text patterns, elatedly chimed in with “BEEP!”, “Zooooom!”, and “Wooooeeee” at all the right spots.
At some point G memorized the book and would recite the text faster than we could turn the pages.
We FaceTimed Jay’s grandparents one night and G ‘read’ Little Blue Truck from memory. He proudly showed them the pages and soaked in their delight and praise of his ‘reading’.
Grandmother and Granddad took both kids to Barnes and Noble for book shopping one afternoon and G instantly found there were several iterations of his beloved Little Blue Truck.
We had all the Little Blue Truck books: the Christmas version that lit up on the final page. The Halloween version with animals decked out in costumes,. We had the spring version with folding flaps on each page. Finally, when G went to kindergarten he got the Spanish version to support his work in Spanish class.
More Than a Book
It’s been years since G asked us to read Little Blue Truck Leads the Way to him. Now that he’s an independent reader he opts for nonfiction, biographies, and graphic novels.
But his collection of Little Blue Truck books are still on the bookshelf in his room. They are in great condition, ripe for another little toddler to enjoy, but I can’t bring myself to donate them.
When I thumb through them now I can hear the excitement in his voice, gleefully predicting the next page as though he’d never heard the book before. I hear him jabbering about, pronouncing new words.
I see him intensely studying each page, examining the illustrations, making sense of what we read to him. I see his chubby toddler hands clutching the book, working effortfully to turn the pages when he claimed he could ‘read’ it to us the first time. I see him lining up all the versions of the book and detailing the connections across the texts he noticed.
In short, it’s a simple children’s picture book. We read it every night for two years. But when I open it, I’m flooded with memories from the not so distant past, and yet it feels like a lifetime ago. It represents simplicity. G’s toughest choice was which book for us to read at bedtime. His primary focus was enjoying his favorite book and learning so much from its pages.
If you find yourself reading or rereading a book to your kid for the thousandth or millionth time, do it. Rereading is the foundation for their future reading and writing success.
Take the time. Reread the book. Indulge their moments of childhood.
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