Tips for reading to your child

Early literacy skills build the foundation that your child will need to become successful readers and writers later in life.   Exposure to text when reading picture books is an easy way to improve a child’s vocabulary. They hear a wider range of words than they would in their everyday conversations. Studies have shown that by age 4, children who are not exposed to a wide range vocabulary have heard up to 30 million fewer words than children who have.  This can impact on their cognitive development as well as their literacy skills.

This is where you come in. At a young age, parent-child interaction is what is important when reading a book.  Discussing the story is more important than actually reading it.  This has significant impact on early language skills and child development. Reading to your child is also an easy way to expose them to new vocabulary.  Discussing what it means and what is happening in the story are going to be more beneficial in the long term.

Here are some tips on how to make the most of this time, not only to expose them to new vocabulary, but to also get their brains engaged.

Pre-Reading

• Look at the front cover and ask what they think the story is about.
• Read the title and see if this changes what they think it is about.
• Ask what characters they think will be in the story.
• If there are any animals or places of note in the pictures on the front cover, ask what they know about them.  For example, if there is a dolphin on the tiger on the cover, do they know anything about tigers?  This helps with connecting to vocabulary later in the story.

During Reading

Here are some ideas for discussions during reading.  Some are more appropriate for certain books.

• Read each page and get them to read it to you or retell what happened on each page.
• Predict what will happen next
• Ask how a character might be feeling
• Discuss new words and what they mean
• Ask ‘why’ questions and get your child to ask you ‘why’ questions.  For example ‘Why do you think he did that?’,
• Ask ‘what would you do?’ type questions.
• Ask ‘how’ questions. For example ‘how do you think the character got into that situation?’

After Reading

Some questions…

• What happened? –
• What was your favourite part of the book?
• What bits didn’t you like?
• How would you have liked it to end?
• How did it make you feel?