1. Model a Love of Reading
First, if we want our teens to read, then they need to see us as adults doing it. We have to make a conscious effort to limit our own time on Netflix or Hulu and spend time reading instead. If we don’t do it (and love it!), how can we expect them to?
2. Make Reading Cool
Point out the many cool people who are already reading for the fun of it. Give them glimpses into your Facebook reader groups, Pinterest Boards, Bookstagram hashtags. Let them see that reading is truly a valid and fun hobby for many others, and it can be for them too.
3. Get Rid of Excuses
Yes, teens are busy with school, sports, and work. But they need to know that the busyness doesn’t go away when they become adults—it just changes form. Whether a person is a teen or adult, “I don’t have enough time to read” is really just an excuse, because we can always carve out time for the things we want to do.
4. Recognize the Need for Changing Tastes
As with any area of a teen’s life, parents can have a difficult time letting go of control, including what books their teens are allowed to read. We must permit our children to develop their individual expressions and tastes, even when that means they decide to read horror novels or pop fiction instead of the genre we love.
5. When All Else Fails… Join Them
Many days (maybe even most days), we feel like we’re fighting a losing battle in getting our teens to put down their phones. In that case, bring books to their devices. The Kindle app is free. Load up their phone with a few books from authors in a genre or two they might like to try. Also, download the Audible app and get them hooked on audiobooks.
One more note about audiobooks: most public libraries now have digital audiobooks available for free through sites like Overdrive or Hoopla, each having their own apps for phones.
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As you know (or may not know!) I’m the mother to five teens and young adults who all have differing feelings about picking up books instead of their phones. While I continue to attempt to make bookworms out of them, I’ve learned that they love audiobooks the best at this stage of their lives.
To help parents recognize the need for changing book tastes, particularly for teen girls, I’ve ventured into writing medieval YA romances with lots of danger, dashing knights, and daring damsels. My new medieval YA series, The Lost Princesses, has all the elements that teens love and might just be the perfect series to hook your teen on reading.
In fact, one mom recently wrote to me telling me that my previous Noble Knights series helped to get her reluctant teen hooked on reading. Her daughter finished my book and came up to her and said, “Mom, now I know how you can read so much!”
As part of the Lost Princesses Series, Always (novella) and Evermore (Book 1) are already available. Foremost (Book 2) releases on Tuesday Sept. 24. You can pre-order it HERE.
Your turn! What are some other ways to help make reading more appealing to teens? Any suggestions for how to get our teens to put down their phones and pick up a book?
Jody Hedlund
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I consider myself fortunate in this regard. My kids were in high school by the time cell phones became a must-have, and their reading habits were already well-established. They are still voracious readers! And yes, they learned from me that you never go anywhere without a book, and that it’s possible to read and eat lunch at the same time. Hey, I stole whatever time I could find when they were young! I also read many of the books they were reading, although I still can’t get them interested in the classics I’d enjoyed when I was young. Buggers.
Yes, you were lucky! This is such a battle nowadays, unfortunately! But I think modeling is so key! (Which means we also have to put down our phones and pick up our books, right?) 🙂
Great blog, Jody – thanks for the encouraging ideas. Though I have no young people in my home I have always tried to emphasize reading with my friends’ children by giving books as gifts. As they’ve become adults very few don’t love to read!