How to Help Your Child Learn to Read
This is a partnered post.
Learning to read is one of the earliest milestones in a child’s education. Every parent wants to help their child read successfully, but it can sometimes be a challenge. The sooner your child learns to read, the easier school tasks will be for them to complete. So, how can you help your child to learn read?
Keep Talking
There are many people who find it embarrassing or dopey talking to babies or small children. However, many studies have shown that the sooner you start talking to your children, the sooner they pick up on vital language skills they’ll need to start reading. The bigger a child’s vocabulary, the easier it will be for them to pick up words when they begin to read them. It doesn’t matter what you talk about to your child. Whether it’s a commentary on your day or talking about family members, your baby will soon learn the meaning of different words.
Start Early
Many people feel that reading to young children is pointless or that young babies aren’t ready for it. However, many babies will register certain words and tones from day one. It’s an excellent way for babies and parents to bond and soon children will connect being read to with something positive. These positive experiences will stay with children and reading will become part of their childhood. If your little one attends a child care center, you’ll notice that reading plays a huge role in their development. The younger you start, the easier it will be.
Teach Phonics
Learning all about phonics is part and parcel of learning how to read. Children need to learn how to break up words in order to pronounce them properly. For example, ‘buh’ ‘ah’ ‘ll’ instead of ‘ball’. Learning the letters and how they sound is the first step to teaching your child smaller words. Once your child knows the sounds for each letter you can move onto writing out each letter and spelling words. This can be a difficult task for young children, so sticking to ten-minute tasks per day is ideal.
Let Your Child Read to You
Even if your child can’t read right now, letting your child make up a story and ‘read it’ to you from a book is a great place to start. You may even be able to show your child words from the story as she tells her own story. You may be surprised by the amount a small child can take in and remember. As your child learns to read, allowing her to read you the books she brings home from school is excellent practice. It’s also a great way to identify any areas she may be having difficulty with.
You need to understand that every kid is different in terms of their learning curve. This is something that parents need to acknowledge and take steps that can help their kids. If your kid is finding it tough to read, experts recommend helping them with books for struggling readers. You need to think of this as a little push which can help them improve one step at a time. Start with small sections, and then gradually increase their reading capacity. Over a period, you will be able to notice a marked improvement in their vocabulary, phonetics as well as their grasping power.
Make Time for Reading
One of the best things you can do is make reading regular activity in your home. Whether you have an allotted reading time or read books before bedtime, storytelling is a wonderful activity for children of all ages.
If children grow up reading, they’re more likely to love reading in adulthood too.