How to Help Your Child with Reading
Parents play the most important role in helping their child to learn, and because parents know their child better than anyone else, they are in a better position to help their child with their early educational development. Children usually start school between four and five years old, which means anything they learn before that is a direct result of parental influence. In other words, parents are their child’s first teachers, home is the child’s first school, and reading is the child’s first subject.
As reading is the foundation for all learning, it’s vital that you introduce your child to words before they start school. Children who are confident about reading have a positive attitude toward learning, and children who read with their families are more likely to develop a love for reading later on in life. From babies and toddlers to pre-schoolers and school-starters, every child learns to read at their own pace. In order to strengthen your child’s reading skills however, you’ll need to provide them with plenty of attention and support as they move through each learning phase.
Literacy
Once your child starts to take an interest in reading, it’s important that they are also introduced to literacy and the reasons why people read and write. Thankfully, you won’t have to go into much detail, but explain the basics of literacy will help your child to grasp further learning in school much easier. For example, your child should know that people read for pleasure and interest as well as to gain information that will help them solve problems. Reading also helps people make informed and rational decisions, and it also helps to keep in contact with family and friends.
If we expand our understanding of literacy, reading and writing is also about how we communicate in society. Your child will eventually learn that literacy is about social practices, knowledge, communication, relationships, languages and culture. People who aren’t literate are excluded from many levels of communication, so it’s important that your child doesn’t take literacy for granted. Knowing how to read and write at a high level will pave the way for academic success, while also improving confidence and motivation.
How You Can Help Your Child
By helping your child to read, write, and think for themselves, you will be opening the door and guiding them on the path of educational independence. You are your child’s first teacher, so learning to read should begin with you reading for them. From newspaper articles to bedtime stories, your child will eventually start taking notice of the sounds coming out of your mouth, and they will want to join in. Acknowledging the ideas and reasoning behind stories is also very important, as it will allow your child to generate meaning instead of just saying words or sentences.
Literacy can be incorporated anywhere, and it shouldn’t just be left to your child’s teachers to develop your son or daughter’s vocabulary and writing ability. Food labels, watching sports, telephone conversations and discussions all incorporate literacy, and the more you integrate education into everyday life with your child, the easier it will be for them to excel within school.
This guest post was submitted by Lloyd on behalf of Notting Hill Editions.