The Great American Family Read-In

The Great American Family Read-In is a wonderful activity to get families reading across America, and anytime is a great time to start. Keep it up all year, and help your family "resolve to read" any way, every day!

Bring a Great American Family Read-In to Your Family

Get your whole family to read the same book. Family members can take turns reading aloud. Encourage long-distance relatives to do likewise with the same title. When the whole clan is assembled (or via phone), host a book discussion.

Get your family reading books about the same topics. Mom and Dad may want to read books about gardening. The kids might find their parent's book even more interesting if everyone's also reading The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett, or if younger readers have been reading Eric Carle's The Tiny Seed or Ruth Krauss's The Carrot Seed.

Get your family to "read across America." There are booklists at this web site with book titles from all 50 states (and others as well). If you enjoy nonfiction, read together about each state's history and unique culture. Or do both!

Enlarge your Read-In to include family and friends from far away. Ask those "across America" to make reading-aloud audio or videotapes and do the same for them.

Write about your family of readers and your family's reading adventures. It can be something as simple as a Reading Autograph Book, a captioned photo album featuring your readers, or a detailed account of the lively discussions raised from reading together.