Night of the Crash Test Dummies - Part 2 - A Far Side Collection - By Gary Larson - Read Aloud

Check out Part 1 at this link - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kEDviFIS4L8

Comics can be a great way to get kids interested in reading. The Far Side is a single panel comic, so it's even more appealing to children who might find length intimidating. It's hard for some children to feel confident reading something when they see a small squeezed together typeface with line upon line of details before they can unravel the point of the thing they're reading. When every page of the book is filled with single panel, self-contained stories, it becomes much more of a game for children. Instead of having to remember everything from pages before, all the child has to do is sound out the words in this one square. They're free to stop whenever they like. Every page is filled with more puzzles as the picture and the words reveal a new situation to laugh at. There are even some cartoons that have no words, kind of a freebie, if you like.

I learned to love reading as a child when I realized that each letter represented a sound and that all people did to read was make each sound to create whole words. I was interested because each word was a puzzle. Soon whole sentences were the puzzle. Meanwhile, my older brother struggled with learning to read because he was being forced to learn by word recognition. The teacher would hold up flashcards with the shapes of common words outlined on them. He thought that this process would continue until he had memorized the entire dictionary. I'm vehemently opposed to word recognition styles of learning. Children need to be encouraged in their struggle to learn reading. It takes practice to master sounding out each letter and blending them into whole words. Many English words require extra practice and familiarity. Without reading them, these words become impossible obstacles for your child to master. To say words like "Fundamentally" or "Ostentatious" doesn't it help to have read them first, to have a picture in your mind of how the letters are ordered so that the word comes out correctly?

A big part of learning to read is keeping it interesting. If you have a son or daughter who is struggling with their reading skills, my recommendation is to branch out and see if there are other kinds of publications that will spark an interest in your child. Sometimes it means setting a timer and just committing to practice each day for a certain amount of time reading. It can be difficult but with perseverance and encouragement and spending time with your children unlocking reading to them by your own example, your children can get better at this important skill. Words help us think. If you can teach your children to read, you unlock the world to them. It is a fundamental skill that will help them succeed in our world.

Gary Larson created these cartoons for years of my childhood and they were always a favorite of mine as I'd run out in the morning to get the paper and then flip through to the Soundlife section of The News Tribune to find the funnies. Reading through this collection I realized that many of these cartoons just won't make sense to younger children because of the references to scientific terms and famous characters and pop culture, but I've attempted here to choose just a few of my favorite cartoons from this collection that hopefully young children can enjoy and laugh at. The Far Side is a wonderful tool for helping children expand their vocabulary. Single-cell comics are also a great way of building interest for reading in children who don't want to spend the time following a whole storyline through a whole book. Some kids just aren't wired to enjoy that. That's okay. They should still learn that reading is a desirable skill since it can open the pages of comic collections like these. So if you have a child you can't get interested in reading, I'd suggest trying some Far Side or other short single page story comics. Thanks for watching!

If you enjoyed this book, you might also like these other videos I've done:
How I Became a Pirate - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c0FlX4NdPH4
A Bad Case of Stripes - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ANrP3oj1wx8
Duck on a Bike - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vduWqDVNTHw&t=50s
Duck on a Tractor - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_OFl_rdbgTc&t=20s
It's Christmas David! - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u34MZdQDFmw&t=27s
Clarinda the Cow Takes Flight - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zaqdQzd6tcs&t=274s