A report today, commissioned for BookTime, a branch of the independent literacy charity Booktrust, reports some interesting findings regarding children’s leisure time and reading habits.
One in every 20 family homes in Britain today has fewer than ten books.
Yet 96% of all children surveyed say that they enjoy reading.
60% of children like to share a book with their parents/carers as it shows that they like to spend time with them.
3% of parents and carers never or rarely read with their children. For those who do, just one in three read with their children on a daily basis.
56% of all parents and carers (and almost half of all parents of 4-5 year olds [48%]) say their child spends more time facing a screen, playing computer games and watching DVDs rather than reading.
Parents and carers of boys are twice as likely not to read with them compared to those who have girls.
Children were asked ‘what stops you reading’ and they reported watching TV (54%) and playing on the computer or video games (41%).
So kids love reading, they love being read to yet half of them are choosing screen based ‘mind numing’ activities rather than reading. As parents we need to make reading a priority. Making time for reading demonstrates the importance we place on it and also increases literacy skills. When one in 5 children leave primary/elementary school without meeting the required standards in literacy we cannot leave this until it is too late. Turn off the TV and pick up a book or use screen time as educational time and introduce them to ebooks!
The independent research was conducted on behalf of Booktime and Booked Up. 1,772 UK parents of primary school aged children and 1,318 children aged 5-12 years took part in the research.
In line with this weeks celebration of Children’s Books I though I would share some of my favorite books as a child. Most of my adventures centered around beautiful princesses, rescuing princes, fairies, and girlish dreams of love. Here is my top 5, I would love to hear yours.
5. The Twelve Dancing Princesses by The Brothers Grim
4. The Eleventh Hour by Graeme Base
3. The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnette
2. Ramona Quimby age 8 by Beverly Cleary
1. The Value of Believing in Yourself: The Story of Louis Pasteur by Spencer Johnson, MD.
I bet you watched and heard of children in others countries on infomercials at 3am talking about poverty, education shortfalls, and the bleak future these children face. The shortage of teachers and schools available leaves children who are left by parents searching for work to enter into the service industry, cleaning the homes of the small amount of wealthy, seamstresses, or manufacturing cheap American goods for export making even less than the products are worth. The scariest of trades comes when these children are kidnapped and forced into the sex industry.
Heartbreaking, and hard to imagine considering the luxury we gain from living in America. But companies are starting to take notice of elearning and the benefits that can be obtained from providing courses to children with refurbished computers.
eLearning can provide a fairly cheap and sometimes donated tool to bring students into learning and give them options other than poverty. It is a way to break the cycle of countries that are struggling to provide education.
eLearning can be the link that gives children success in the most unsuccessful countries and even in within the US, states that have large areas of poverty can benefit from programs that provide refurbished computers and software that enhances learning. Tools that could be used in community centers, after school programs and church outreach. eLearning is no longer just about books, it is a whole new opportunity for giving the greatest tool for advancement - knowledge.
ebooks are catching on, and not just on Amazon or with Sony, but with big name publishers. The Guardian out of the UK stated in a artical regarding the London Book Fair, that ebooks are a booming and rising options for readers. The market is starting to take a second look at what they can expect and gain from this technology. Some also, however, ask the question is it like VHS v. Beta-max? Will the price point and format war be the killer or will the strong survive and flourish?
In south Alabama, Jackson High School has won the Laura Bush Gulf Coast School Library Recovery Initiative Grants Program for $25,000, in order to expand the reference material within the school to ebook format. A big win for the high school and an even bigger win for the ebook market. The fact that schools are catching on and seeing the benefit to their technologically advance and majority technology friendly students want them is major. This way they might actually look up the information instead of buying it from a paper “genius”.
I have to mention that it has been finals week for me so I apologize for my absence. I have been thinking as I have sat in the library for about a week, if there was a cot I would have slept here, anyway, if universities incorporated ebooks into their format for finals and for studying the use and need would be wonderful for students and also would save tremendously on paper. I asked my professor what we spent on paper (each professor has an account that the university pays but keeps track of) this semester his amount copied and printed was over $400 worth of paper. So my point being that ebooks and etests would be nice, convient not to mention Earth friendly.
I noticed Oprah is now Twittering, I wonder is the magic gone or growing from Twitter, now that everyone is doing it does it bring growth or new way to fail? I think the same about ebooks, many people ask me the same question in regard to ebooks and elearning for kids, “will it bring growth, or a new way to be lazy?
Let me just say I firmly believe that ebooks will bring a new way to be productive. A new way for kids to learn, and share knowledge across a wider table. eBooks will allow more knowledge to be given and taken and also people who could not get a book deal can write to another audience. I know moms who would love to write for kids, and kids who write for kids and ebook publishing gives them a chance.
So I ask you ebooks, a buzz word or the new great read?
I am delighted to introduce you to guest blogger Stacey Root. She is the senior contributing writer for Nextinlearning.com. As a single mom and survivor of Postpartum Depression, she shares this life saving idea for those of us with small children just begging to “work!”
“I hear this every day at least 3000 times. Only the first 5 are cute, the rest are just annoying. As a full-time student and writer who works from the corner at home, my pre-schooler sees me working and loves to “work” with me (or press the delete button and erase my whole article). Well, to save the function of my MacBook, I purchased a mini-laptop for my boys and my pre-schooler was hired.
I struggled with what sites, what games, what puzzles and having to assist him, mouse clicking, page loads, all around stress for me and frustration for him.
But then the sky opened and bells sounded. I found ebooks. Simple, they read to him, have puzzles after the story and there are a ton of stories. I really like Wizz-E.com because they have familiar stories as well as some new ones that grab his attention. There’s games and great flash animation, his favorite is the way the “sparkles” from the wizard’s wand follow his “hand” from the mouse.
There are some great sites out there that can give your little “worker” things to do while you work or do laundry or read. Wizz-E is not a replacement for traditional cuddle up on the couch under a warm blanket, which they proudly proclaim.Wizz-E.com works with roomtoread.org donating 10% of ebook sales to the furthering of children’s literature.
Online sites that provide learning games and books, even music can give your little employee a way to learn and feel like he is spending time with you while you have to spend time on work. If you are not a work-in-the-home mom, and just need that 5 minutes of peace that Kathy Ireland spoke about in her post, these are a great sanity-saver. And if you are not either of these moms and just like to see your little one learn and excel or master new words and letters or grasp the new technologies, these are fun way to introduce computers.
I am kinda hooked on the ebook thing, I even love to download my textbooks, and Kindle books to my phone. Awww, technology!”
What a great time to show your green by skipping those paper books and find some new reads in ebooks. Not only are they a simple and easy way to catch up on your Spring reading list ebooks are completely GREEN!
The people at All Romance eBooks have launched a site all about going green. Not about authors or stories, but promoting the ebooks and all the glories that come with using them.
We chose to do this because the idea that nature should be preserved is important to us. It is a core value and one of the reasons that we adore eBooks
eBooks are delivered to the end user electronically. They are read electronically. They are disposed of with a push of a delete button, without ever taking up room in a landfill.
Some numbers:
Consider This:
It takes twelve trees to produce a ton of printing paper. Twenty-four trees for higher grade writing paper.
A mature tree can produce as much oxygen in a season as ten people inhale in a year.
Only 5% of the paper used in the book industry is recycled.
Up to 35% of books printed for consumers are never read. They are returned to the publisher and end up in landfills.
71% of the world’s paper supply comes from natural forests, rather than tree farms.
So, this St. Paddy’s day show the world that being green doesn’t have to end on March 18 and those trees can live another day!
eBook Week has ended but that does not mean the reading has ended.
In fact Erika Smith of the IndyStar.com has called 2009 the “Year of the eBook.” With retailers gearing up for a paper/ebook fight the winners are yet to be determined. Amazon and Sony have been leading the pack with their ebook readers that have come out early and with a fierce support and book download service. However, Barnes and Noble hopes to lap them with the ebook store they are launching later this year.
By the year 2012 Price Waterhouse Cooper estimates the sales of ebooks to be around $12 Billion, yeah billion.
So whats the significance of ebook week and the sales of ebooks? It shows that the market is ready for ebooks. The market is ready becuase the people are ready. The cycle of want and need, desire and purchase or simply, supply and demand. With the market and people ready that means that technology and uses will improve. Better school use, better teaching use, more availability in the classroom and most important more opportunity for our children to read and learn in a 3 dimensional world.
American kids want their new president to do a few things for them.
Like, bring nine-year-old Lonnie’s dad home from Iraq.
Or find a job for 10-year-old Zachary’s dad in Michigan.
Or make it rain candy for six-year-old Aaron.
These are just a few of the tiny requests coming from 45 hundred or so 5-12 year olds that were being asked of the newly appointed leader. All petitions came to Kid Thingand with the generous assistance of the National Education Association the winning hopes were neatly organized into not just a book, or journal but an E-BOOK!
The young bidders then shipped the book off to a very special address, 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, you know the White House!!
This little initiative will help launch education, reading and the value of the ebooks. I mean if the President likes them, they have to be super cool!
With these tough economic times everyone it seems is finding a way to utilize what resources they have to not only improve the bottle line but raise the bar for their customers. I can tell you that I love getting magazines, its like a little present in the mail just for me, but to be honest I am finding it a tough justification to pay the cost. Publishers are feeling the same way. With newspaper and magazine sales down 50% publishers are seeking new media to get their news into your hands.
With the big time sales of E-ink readers such as the Amazon Kindle I & II and the Sony Reader, the man behind the pages of everything from Cosmopolitan to Esquire and the San Francisco Chronicle has put into action a large format wireless E-ink reader of his own. Kenneth Bronfin, exec at Hearst says:
”I can’t tell you the details of what we are doing, but I can say we are keenly interested in this, and expect these devices will be a big part of our future,”
All this comes from the new technology, the money flow is not as flowing and business still want to maintain the integrity and following while cutting the cost of printing. The publishing industry is a $300 billion dollar industry, with most of the income going back into the printing of newspapers and periodicals. Within the year Hearst plans to release a black and white version of the new reader and a large format high resolution model that folds as well as allows for full page reading and ads to be seen.
What Hearst and its partners plan to do is sell the e-readers to publishers and to take a cut of the revenue derived from selling magazines and newspapers on these devices. The company will, however, leave it to the publishers to develop their own branding and payment models. “That’s something you will never see Amazon do,” someone familiar with the Hearst project said. “They aren’t going to give up control of the devices.”
I love that they are not afraid to let go and allow others to embrace this idea, they know that they have a handle on the market and with this new technology things can only grow and become better . Love this idea.
What do you think, are E-ink readers better than the paper (non-green) version? Which would you buy?
I am delighted to introduce you to guest blogger Stacey Root. She is the senior contributing writer for 
We chose to do this because the idea that nature should be preserved is important to us. It is a core value and one of the reasons that we adore eBooks 
