Gearing up for Summer Reading 2013 with our new favorite reading app

We’ve approached the end of the school year and I’m confident that Peanut has reached the reading milestone that he needed to end the first grade with (insert happy dance and party in my head here).

Seriously, you couldn’t ask for a happier mom right now. I listen to him read at night and I get excited over the fact that he asks for my help less and less.

However, now I feel like the really important work is just about to begin. Experts say that kids lose about a month of learning over the summer and it’s extremely important to me that Peanut doesn’t lose the skills he’s worked so hard to acquire.

Once again this summer the kids will sign up for a summer reading program. We’ll sign up through our local library but I’m also considering signing them for Scholastic’s Summer Reading Program as well.

The idea of prizes always appeals to kids so I think this will be a great way to keep Peanut motivated to keep reading but just in case it doesn’t, I’m upping my game.

I recently found a free app for iPhone/iPod called Reader Buddy that lets you keep track of how long you read. You can register each member of the family and keep a log of every book and the amount of time they spend reading. Peanut has already started using the app and he LOVES IT.

Reader Buddy works like this:

Register your reader (even yourself) with name and birth date.

To add books you can either scan the barcode on the back of the book (this is Peanut’s favorite part) or put in the book’s information manually. (I had to do this for an ebook that I’m currently reading).

Then you assign the book to a reader. Once a reader is assigned to a book, tap on the reader and then the book to go to the timer. Tap “Start” to begin keeping track of reading time and when you’re done tap “Save.” The reading time is saved in the book’s log.

I like that you can email the reading the logs too so if you want to send yourself (or a teacher) an update on reading time you can email it to them.

An added advantage of Reader Buddy that I found is that since it keeps track of time, you can see how long each book takes to read. Because his books are relatively short, I can see which books he might benefit from reading again (more practice or more challenging) and which books are easier or that he’s mastered.

How cool is that?

I’m going to craft my own summer reading challenge between Peanut and me by creating a contest of who can read the most this summer. We will keep track with Reader Buddy and then tally up our scores at the end of every month. I think he’ll like the competing against mom aspect and it will push him to read more. He’ll get prizes from the summer reading programs and he’ll (more than likely) get something special for beating mom at our own competition.

Are you joining a summer reading program this summer?

**Disclosure – This is not a sponsored post or review for Scholastic or Reader Buddy other than the fact that I was checking out another reading timer app and a reviewer of said app said they liked this one better so I looked it up and checked it out myself. I doubt Reader Buddy even knows who I am or that I’m writing about how much we love them.