Children Reading

Children Who Read Are Children Who Learn

I am passionate about children reading.

Some parents are happy for the schools to teach children reading.

I believe it’s best to start before your kids reach school, way before.

Start by reading to your children when they are tiny. Reading aloud.

Some people are intimidated by this. They don’t want to seem foolish, or are embarrassed or just don’t see it as important.

I’m a very shy person. When I first started reading to my daughter she was only 4 or 5 months old. I couldn’t do it with my husband in the room. I was just too embarrassed.

Before long, I was completely hooked. I’d always loved children’s books and the joy of being able to read them every day, often 3 times a day, was just wonderful.

I didn’t care who was in the room as long as I got to read to my daughter and see her enjoying the whole experience with me.

Now, I’ll read to anyone, I even sing if I think it’ll get a laugh! Yes, I’m still shy, but I’m comfortable that I can read aloud and enjoy it.

Reading To Your Children

I strongly believe that a child’s confidence in reading can impact on many areas in their lives.

• Their ability to express themselves
• Their ability to understand language
• Their interest in learning
• The ability to sit still
• The ability to concentrate
• Sharing information
• All of which impacts on how they make friends
• How they relate to the people around them
• Their confidence in whether to continue their education to a tertiary level
• What kind of career or job they may choose

If you are a time pressed parent the one thing I would urge you never to skimp on is reading time.

Children Reading Along

So why read aloud to your kids?

Firstly, it’s a great way to structure bed time. It’s a quiet activity that can signal slowing down, getting ready for bed.

Secondly, it’s a time to be close to your children. You are focused on them, the story and the moment.

It’s precious to them and shows them how much you love them. Even if you have had a terrible day together, at bedtime, if you put that aside, snuggle up and read a story, well, that’s unconditional love.

The best part is that almost by accident you are exposing your child to “literacy activities” from a young age. As you read to them they ‘read’ along too.

This helps them to make the difficult leap in understanding that printed words relate to spoken words.

That’s a huge advantage when they start school. Your child will already understand so much more about reading and writing, sentence structure, story structure, the difference between fiction and non-fiction, and why this is important.

Problems With Children Reading

If a child has no experience with sitting still and enjoying a picture book, then it can be a rude shock to arrive at school and be expected to do just that.

Having regular (daily) reading sessions can help with that.

It will fuel their imaginations and creativity which in turn helps in problem solving and decision making…now I’m not an expert. I’m just going on what I’ve read myself and what I’ve observed in my own child and the children around her and I guarantee that the teacher knew within minutes of meeting each child for the first time, which ones had been read to regularly and which hadn’t.

I’m not doing this to impress a teacher or to show off my child like some performing seal, I’m doing it because it has made a very real difference to her and we both look forward to story time together.

It was never my intention that my child learn to read early. I just wanted to share my own love of reading with her – at the time I had no idea how many other benefits there would be.

Children reading picture books teaches your child about words, communication, language, emotions...

I’m not an education professional so I won’t pretend to have all the answers on this one, but from my own example, it meant that my daughter went to school with no fear of learning and an absolute thirst for knowledge.

Teaching Children to Read

Teaching children to read starts with some simple steps you can do at home.

It’s free and it’s fun!

Many problems with children reading can be avoided by reading aloud to your kids in a loving and fun way.

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