November 24, 2011

Parents - nurture your child's love for reading.

In this world of social media and video games, our children's proximity to books is a dwindling reality. With every other teenager and children as young as 10 yrs old having their own swanky handhelds, texting, tweeting and chatting occupy the larger part of their day -- its use is for anything but reading as in the more formal sense of it. Chat, twitter and facebook all cater to the brevity of the written statement and a demise of large blocks of text as attractants to youth. In a time where speed is glorified, from the speed of internet access, the acquisition of wealth, power and position and any other human aspiration, the refreshing tantalizations that reading embodies is being soon forgotten or dumped as baggage from the past. "We don't need to be tantalized and kept waiting" seems to be the pertinent refrain --- for the order of the day is instant gratification.

Parents, let's look at the consequences of this pervasive culture on the growth and development of our children's sensibilities. Books give childen a peek into the experiences and values of our past through the experiences of those who have inhabited our spaces before we came into being. The enormous library of knowledge, awareness and experiences aggregated in the written body of knowledge provides our link to this past and gives our children the bearings to be good citizens of tomorrow. As we know today, our success in life depends more on our emotional intelligence or emotional quotient than on our intelligence quotient. That is accepted as truth today and is starkly rational, for our ability to make relationships work is what makes us better sharing human being rather than just selfish human objects. The building blocks of making and living in such sharing relationships is a good comprehension of our world from various angles. That is the gold mine of opportunity reading provides to our children and their love nurtured for it will be the good harbingers of a successful future - success defined as a satisfied journey through our life on this earth.

It is said, a mind is a terrible thing to waste. Parents! Please don't lose this opportunity to chart a cherished future for your children. Even as you give them those shiny handhelds, please don't neglect offering them the edge reading will ensure.

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