We all know the importance of learning to read. Reading can broaden children’s horizons and enhance their imaginations, but it also has a huge role in the rest of their lives. Every activity, education and career path or job requires good reading skills. By making reading an enjoyable activity in children’s lives, we can instill these skills in children at a young age, and encourage them to continue reading and expanding their vocabularies as they grow older.
Senator James H. Donovan recognized this, and started a program called PARP- Parents as Reading Partners as a means to achieve this goal. He believed that if parents spent at least 15 minutes each day to read with their child, the child would both enjoy reading and acquire the skills necessary to succeed academically. The child need not read alone- the reading should alternate between the child and the parent, so that the child does not get discouraged if he or she is having difficulty reading. This method does not only help instill reading skills, it also increases parent involvement in the child’s life and may encourage the child to express his or her opinions about the book, school and more. This program has been adopted by a great number of schools and parents on their own, and is helping children everywhere.