12 Ways to Make Reading Interactive

By Alissa Marquess Zorn on October 3, 2013 (updated October 24, 2016)

Here are 12 ways to be a reading hero for your kids – they’ll love when their favorite stories come to life with these activities.

Reading is a great way to connect with kids. Sometimes reading a books together smooths a rough day or gives your big kid a chance to be your baby again, if just for a moment. But it reading doesn’t have to be passive, there are lots of ways to make reading an interactive activity.

If you find yourself in a reading rut, try some fun reading related activities:

Draw a picture together from the story.
Make up a different story about the characters.

Look at a comic and have your child tell the story.

Listen to a book on tape together.

Ask your beginning reader to read a toddler book to your younger child.

Act out the story with stuffed animals.
Ask questions about the story –would you have done the same thing as the main character?
Make up a different ending.
Make up a fantasy about a part of the story.
Tell the same story from a different perspective, such as the Three little pigs from the point of view of the wolf.
Make puppets of the characters, this can be as simple as drawing pictures and cutting them out to paste on sticks.
Merge characters from different stories, What if Winnie the Pooh met Peter Rabbit?