This book made me reflect on my childhood and how much my parents actually did read to me with a large portion being the Bible which I believe had the greatest affect on my life- Truth was poured into me every. It gives healthy information about fathers especially stepping up their game to influence their children (boys in particular) in education and reading. It didn’t only give facts, statistics, and reasons why parents should read to their children, but it also brought to light the recent effects of TV, cell phones, e-readers, the internet, etc, etc, and how this is impacting children and adults alike. This book turned out to be way more informative than I expected. But it's almost like he was trying to get a spot on her show or something. What is with the Oprah worship? I mean, I agree that the woman is incredibly powerful and used her power to get A LOT of people reading and discussing books and I think that's wonderful. The rest of it is maybe worth a quick scan. So basically, the Treasury of Read-Alouds makes this book completely worth time and even money. Trelease's information in that section is very interesting and that's a practice that probably doesn't really occur to many of us. I did like the emphasis on reading to children even as they get older and are able to read to themselves. And that is typical of a lot of his correlational claims throughout the book. But Trelease is totally implying that the reading obsession that consumes kids during their Harry Potter years is linked to a drop in teen pregnancies? What? That needs a VERY significant amount of research to draw any kind of usable correlation. Are those tied to Harry Potter mania? I doubt it. Well, what other random social statistics changed during those same ten years? I'm certain there were negative changes. For example, 'In the nearly ten years since the arrival of the Potter books, school crime was down, teen pregnancies declined, and teen smoking and drug use dropped.' Okay.

The conclusions Trelease draws from the research he is citing are often a pretty big stretch.

For one thing, the writing and reasoning are lacking. Some of the information is really inspiring and some of it just fell flat for me. Plus, the overall thrust of the book (read out loud to your kids) is something I am passionate about. I would buy this book for that alone and I give 5 stars to that part, which is significant because it comprises over half of the book. On the one hand, Trelease's treasury of read-aloud books is AWESOME. I have really mixed feelings about this book.

The read aloud handbook seventh edition