At What Age Did You Let Your Kids Read or Watch Harry Potter?

My daughter started out reading each book at age 5 and she is almost done with the series 3 almost 4 years later.Now she is in honers reading.

My daughter was nine when the first book came out. I would have had no objection to her reading it if she had been younger.

I truly don't know any kids who haven't seen all the movies and if they like to read they've read the books. Most were under school age when they saw the movies. Some even went to the theater and saw them.

Well I have 2 kids that are 6 and 10.
My son, the 6 year old, well it is too scary for him.
I know that, he knows that and says so.
But he is young.
My daughter, the 10 year old, well her classmates were starting to read that in 3rd grade. Depends on the kid and if they get scared or not.
My daughter was not scared of it by that grade, but she had no interest in the book or the series, even if *I* liked it and read them all. And she had no interest in the book series even if many of her classmates read it. She looked at the Harry Potter books I have. She didn't like it. But in 4th grade she saw the movies. She was 8-9 then. The movie didn't scare her.

So its also up to the child and what their interests are and their threshold for "scariness" or not.

How old, are your kids?
As an aside, the "Redwall" series of books are great.
I loved them as a kid.
Its by Brian Jacques.
Or "The Sisters Grimm" book series. LOVE that series and my daughter loved it too.

I don't have an exact answer, but I hope mine will be able to handle the books around 8 or 9. Maybe 10. I haven't decided on the movies - it's my favorite series ever, but I can appreciate the good vs. evil, and imagination vs. reality far better than a young child could. There's a lot of humor that will be missed by younger readers. That said, I can't wait! I'm ready to share them now, but trying to be patient given the mature content. :)

The other thing stopping me? I watched Wizard of Oz way too young, and to this day, I can't stand it. Scared me to death when I was little. I don't want that to happen to them.

Follow your parental instincts and you'll do just fine. You'll be able to sense if they're not ready.

I read the first three books out loud to my son when he was 7/8 years old. After that he (and I) read the rest on our own, and we saw the movies as they came out, so my kids were like, 5, 8 and 10 for the first movie (?)

We haven't introduced this series yet to our son. My husband and I both read all of the books and have watched all the movies and truly enjoyed it, so it's something we hope Kiddo will enjoy when the time is right for him. He's not asking and isn't interested. Ideally, because of some of the content (parents killed, being abused by relatives, some of the more mature content) we feel like Kiddo could be about 8 or 9 with the first book and we'll take it from there.

I think the movies are something else entirely. It's one thing for a kid to imagine the scenes they read based on what they already have seen/known/experienced in life, but movie makers are often way beyond that in what they present. In our family, we're pretty thoughtful about going at Kiddo's pace; we'll let his level of maturity and tolerance of 'thrilling' scenes be our guide.

Our son was 7 when we began reading the books.
He was reading them on his own in the 3rd grade and his school librarian couldn't believe it - she tested him (had him read the first 2 pages to her out loud) before she let him check the book out.
The books never scared him but then he loved all the dinosaurs from Jurassic Park movies too (even the ones with sharp teeth).

This is a fresh experience for us.

First off I was pregnant with ds in line at midmight with mil for the release of one of the HP books. couldnt' tell you which one as i am not a detail person, but mil, sil and i have all been reading the books and seeing the movies as they came out, big fans. Lord of the rings fans too.

Ds is a voracious reader and has been since he learned to read.
This year in third grade, he will be 10 yo soon, he really got into reading competitively, lol, the AR program at school. In order to one up one of the girls in the class, he asked if he could start HP.

I sat him down and explained how much he would enjoy them if he waited until summer when he would have alll day and nothing else to do but read, great right? little stinker snuck it from the school library. I'm writing this a little light heartedly but i was disappointed in him and he will face the natural consequenses of having his first read of it not be a slow focused time. I hadn't actually banned it and i know him well enough to know that he would have stopped had he really gotten scared.
-- At that point, he went on to read them all. We've talked about the book, some things i think he didn't really pick up on, perhaps because he was rushed or his maturity level, somethings he did get.

I expected more questions and for him to be more upset than he let on. He did have trouble sleeping at one point but that might have been due to a sleepover that wasn't supervised as well as i would have liked.

long story short a sheltered kid, was fine with ALL the books at age 9 1/2

He has asked to watch the first movie and he says maybe the second but that is all he wants for now. So we might try that this weekend. We have never let the kids watch pg movies and he is one to get freaked out by Disney movies so i don't know how it will go.

I"ll also add that while i love the cast, i wished the movies had been more like the Hogwarts etc that i pictured in my mind. I'm not a huge fan of the movies. LOTR how ever, very excellent!

my advice, if you expect your kid would -fly through them, i would hold off as long as you can, they are so good, but they really should allow a year in between for maturation and that worked well when the books were first released but now that you can go grab them off the shelf i think it's just too tempting

My oldest was 8 when the first book came out...and I got it for him. He read it in NO time, and his 7 year old brother was next. The next book came out, and they were FIGHTING over who should read it first. That is when I decided I better be reading the series myself.

For them, those were perfect ages, and they were able to sort of mature with the characters and themes in the books as they came out.

I honestly do not know what I would do now, since all the books are available at the same time. I might try to space the books out a little...the first few were OK for youngers, but definitely more mature through the series.

It was 4th grade (9-10) reading material at our school.

We are watching Chamber of Secrets with my almost 4.5 year old now. The real time report is that she's doing ok with it (lots of questions) although I'm not sure she'll make it through the basilisc and rescuing of Ginny Weasely towards the end. Its kind of violent and scary and she's moderately sensitive to that.

I don't intend to start the books for a couple more years. We are only beginning chapter books now.

I think 8 is a good age to start these books. And I have a problem with people who say "my child read these books at 5, or 6" when what they mean is the child listened to them on tape. That is NOT reading them. that is like a baby with a propped bottle. it is force feeding. Also note that just because a child is mentally able to sound out the works in a book does not in any way mean they are ready to read the content. My son was 8 when the first one came out. his younger brother a 15 months younger. they both read them as they came out. the youngest son had to wait until he was 8 to star tthe series as I do not think that he needed to be reading book 7 when he was 8 or 9 years old.

I think you are wise to hold off on them until your child is actually able to read them and understand what he is reading. Like a previous poster said there is some questionable content for a young reader. They are wonderful books but if your little one is not ready then hold off.

I am not trying to offend anyone please don't report me as flaming lol. It is a pet peeve of mine. I have a friend who goes on and on about what her 6 year old has read. he can't read diddly he listens. not the same thing at all.

It came out when our daughter was 8.. I think she could have handled it at 7.. Just today she told me, those were her favorite books from her childhood. She is 22.

My daughter was 7 or 8 when she started watching and reading the movies/books.

I tried watching the 2nd movie with my 6 yr old last week, but he thought it was too scary. I am not sure what, exactly, scared him.

I can see us reading the books when he's 8-10ish, to start, and then the darker books in his pre-teen/teen years.

My oldest is 7 and younger sibs are 5 and almost 4. I'm eagerly waiting too.....I'm pretty sure my older two would grasp and stay interested for nightly reading (I know my 7 year old would) but I'm probably waiting until my youngest is a bit older so I don't have to read it out loud twice :) The older two will be even better able to comprehend a bit later, so....now all I have to be is patient. And no movies before books in our house! :)

The movies? Around 2, I've never understood what the issue is.

The books, well mine were older when they came out, the movies came out when my younger ones were little and after the older ones read the books, so they'll probably never read the books and only know them because of the movies.

My dd was 2 when she watched the movie. It was a marathon. I fell asleep on the 2nd installment. I woke up and I was going to turn it off and there she was still bright eyed and watching at 1:30 am.

Now my dd just finished 3rd grade and will be 9 in July. she has finished the first 2 books and is halfway on the 3rd. She loves them. She is an avid reader and loves this series among others. For my dd this is the best age. A lot of kids have a high reading proficiencies but it does not mean they are ready for these type of books. Mine was reading at a 6 grade level in 2nd grade but at that time, I don't think she was ready (Not because of the plot but it was simply too thick and she had too many interests). Now, she reads Harry Potter and plays Harry Potter with her friends.

My son was 7 when the first book came out. He read it and loved it. My daughter was 5 and a good reader. They read each book as it came out. We listened to the books on cd in the car, too.
My kids still love Harry!

I tried the first with my6 yo, but she did not maintain interest. I think she will be old enough to enjoy it when she is able to read it on her own.

My 8 and 10 year old started reading them this year. They have been watching the movies for 2 years or so. They try to persuade my 5 year old to watch the movies with them, but she gets too frightened.

My daughter was 5 when she started reading the books. Before the movies were made. She saw the movies when they came out.

My DS started watching them when he was 3, he came with me and a friend of mine to see the last 2 I believe(maybe it was just the last one) My DD is 2 (almost 3) and when they have a marathon weekend on tv both of them will sit and watch them.

I have the first 5 books.. I read them and saved them. My DS will be 7 in July and I think when we finish Stuart Little we will start the 1st book.

My 7 yr old twins (7 this past feb) were very interested in starting reading and watching the movies. I was a bit nervous at first, and we started watching the movies - the first two weren't too scary, but they were intense for them. We've gotten through the first three and they kind of moved on to other movies. I'm sure we'll get back to the Harry Potter series though. One of the twins has started to read the first book, she enjoyed how she could familiarize the book with the movie. I'm not sure if she'd completely grasp the entire book without having seen the movie.

I think each child is different, start with the first movie, watch it with the kids, and see how they do.

I have to do the math but..my boys are 12 & 9. They have seen each movie as soon as it came out, the day we got the DVD/Blu-ray. They seen each of the movies more than once at this point. My daughter is 4 and has seen them at this point as well.
They haven't read the books themselves yet but I was reading them out load to my oldest when he was 7 months old.
We love Harry Potter! They are some of the best books I have read in ages and the movies were great! My kids all love them too.