Many children struggle with reading, especially when they’re at home and teachers are far away.
In fact, even before the recent pandemic, 65% of America’s fourth graders weren’t reading at a proficient level, according to The Literacy Project Foundation.
Reading is important because reading is fundamental to academic and career success. Books can also add more joy and meaning to life.
Fortunately, there are many things a parent can do at home to help build literacy skills.
{ Guest Post by Holly }
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Help your child stay on track with their education and language development while they’re at home.
Consider these tips for teaching reading skills and creating an environment that will encourage a lifelong love for books.
Strategies for Helping Younger Kids to Read
Most experts believe that teaching phonics to young children is essential for fluency and reading comprehension.
Try these tips to provide your kids with a strong foundation for reading:
Talk together
Speaking and singing to your child boosts their brain power and vocabulary. You can start while they’re still a baby.
Narrate what you’re doing. They’ll learn to associate actions with new words.
Vary your own vocabulary. Using more words and defining them adds them to your child’s vocabulary.
Practice conversations by pretend playing.
Emphasize letters and sounds
Play games that teach alphabet letters and sounds.
Keep in mind that your child’s attention span is limited, so keep your lessons brief and repeat the same material often.
Label things
Kids love stickers, so put them on objects around the house like furniture and toys.
Practice looking at the names of things and saying them together.
Write your child’s name in large letters and tape it to their bedroom door. They’ll learn to recognize it every day when they enter or leave their room.
Draw pictures
Drawing involves some of the same brain activity as reading.
Give your child crayons and paper to help them express their thoughts about things you discuss and read together.
Start writing
Many children can write their name or their first initial by the time they’re 3 years old.
You can also ask them to dictate a letter to you and go over it to see which letters they recognize.
Ask them to write the first letter of a word by sound. Phonics and beginning sounds are the beginning of learning to read.
Take advantage of your library
Check out the children’s events and materials at your local library.
Enjoy what’s available online if you’re waiting for them to reopen.
Try online educational resources like ABCMouse. It’s set up to teach kids how to read at an age appropriate level.
Read out loud
Make story time part of your daily schedule.
Ask your child questions about the characters and plot to stimulate their thinking.
Strategies for Helping Older Children to Read
Some studies have found that kids read for fun less and less as they grow older.
How can you help your tweens and teens to appreciate literature when they’re attached to their smartphones?
Consider these ideas:
Offer choices
Let your child pick what kind of material they want to read. Graphic novels may trigger their interest in the original classic works.
Try audiobooks. Audible is a great solution to keeping attention.
Scribd is also a good choice if you like to listen to more than one audiobook a month.
Build a nook
Provide a comfortable and attractive place to read.
Put a bookshelf full of interesting titles under a window seat.
Create a home library in one corner of your living room or finished basement.
Watch movies
When it’s your turn to choose the movie, pick a film that’s based on a book.
It also helps to maintain sensible limits on screen time to encourage reading and other offline activities.
Be a role model
Your kids are more likely to read if they see you enjoying books and magazines.
Make reading for pleasure part of each day and talk about what you learned.
Seek professional help
If you’re concerned about your child’s reading proficiency, talk with their teacher and doctor.
They may need help with a learning disability, or they may benefit from additional resources such as tutoring or more intensive instruction.
You can enrich your child’s life by fostering a love for books
Start early with teaching language skills and helping your child to see themselves as a reader.
As a parent, you can help them to learn and grow even when they’re stuck at home.
Thank you to Holly for this guest post!
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