Jim Trelease was for 20 years an award-winning artist and journalist before turning his career toward education in 1979.

He had been reading aloud to his two children each night, as his own father had once read to him. And he had been visiting classrooms as a volunteer, to talk about careers in art and journalism.

He began to notice that not many of the children he met read very much for pleasure, but the ones who did nearly always came from classrooms where the teachers read aloud daily and incorporated silent reading time into the daily routine.

He began to investigate the connection and discovered plenty of research written up in academic language in educational journals, but nothing for parents.

So he wrote and self-published The Read-Aloud Handbook. Then in 1982, Penguin USA picked up and published the book, and Dear Abby helped make it known to parents everywhere.

Here’s how it looked when I first heard about Jim Trelease.

The seventh edition of the book is due out this June.

Since 1983, Jim has lectured and written full-time. His primary focus has been the impact of reading aloud to children at home and in school on the child’s educational development.

“Every time you read to a child, you’re sending a ‘pleasure’ message to the child’s brain.”–Jim Trelease

So why am I writing about this subject on a blog for Christian parents and writers?

Because I wonder if children who are read to regularly and who learn to enjoy reading are more apt to view the Bible as a readable book.

And because I can’t help thinking about the impact of reading the Bible aloud to children on their faith development.

What do you think?

You can download a PDF of Jim’s brochure “Why Read Aloud to Children?” here.

Or visit his website, Trelease on Reading, where you can read excerpts from the current edition of The Read Aloud Handbook.

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Announcing the winners of our Whit’s End Mealtime Devotions giveaway! Among those who entered the drawing using the form that provided with the post, Janice Green is the winner. I also drew a second winner from the remaining entrants who used the form plus those who liked our FB page while the giveaway was running or left a comment on the post but didn’t use the form (because I think there was some confusion about that). I have a second copy of the book to give, and that winner is Vickie Bond. Congratulations! Your books will be in the mail soon.