The Read-Aloud Family: Making Meaningful and Lasting Connections with Your Kids

by Sarah Mackenzie

Audiobooks, you may remember from chapter 7, count. The car is an excellent time to play audiobooks. We get a lot of reading aloud in during our thirty-five-minute drive to and from homeschool co-op every week, and we find that road trips are far more enjoyable when we listen to an audiobook together. When I hear the Little House audiobooks read by Cherry Jones (a favorite in our family), I immediately think of long drives across I-90 in Washington State during the year we moved from one side of the state to the other. The endless Washington wheat fields are married, in my mind, to Pa’s fiddle and Laura’s harrowing descriptions of The Long Winter and the town spelling bee. I’ll always think of Laura when I’m crossing I-90. I hope my kids will, too. In the car, your kids are basically a captive audience. If yours (like mine) tend to squabble on road trips, you’ll find audiobooks a welcome reprieve. Either way, you’ll get more read-alouds in if you use time you’re already spending in the car to enjoy a book together.