Tips to Help Your Child Love Reading
Originally published on the motherhoodlater.com website
Reading is one of the most important skills for success in school. When students read regularly, they tend to perform better academically and demonstrate stronger comprehension, fluency, vocabulary, spelling, and writing skills – skills that affect nearly all aspects of school. For some children, the idea of reading is dreadful, especially when there are so many other ways to spend their free time. Help your child learn to love reading with the ideas detailed below.
Make it a ritual!
Start reading daily to your child when they are very young, even if you don’t think they will understand every word on the page. Just exposing them to books and language is a great start for developing a love for reading. Choose books that are colorful and engaging so your child enjoys the experience. When they are a little older and begin learning how to read, have them try to sound out some basic words in the books you read to them, including simple words like “in”, “mat” or “tub.” Later, you may want to bring in two types of books: shorter decodable books at your child’s reading level that they can read to you, and longer, colorful, more language-rich books that you read to them, which helps build higher level vocabulary and auditory comprehension skills. When your child is in elementary school and capable of reading on their own, have them read either out loud or independently for at least 20 minutes per day. You may want to encourage them to read right before bed, which creates a ritual and helps them wind down before going to sleep. Physical and electronic books are both great options; whichever one they prefer is fine, as long as they read consistently.
Let them choose the topic
Another great way to help your child enjoy reading is encouraging them to read books on any topic of their choice. Just about any topic can work – dinosaurs, rainbows, tornadoes, zoos – you name it! Help them find reading material on that topic and don’t just limit it to books; newspapers, magazines, and articles from the internet count too. Once they develop proficiency with reading material on topics they love, they will likely start to venture into other topics and begin reading a more vast array of books and reading material as their confidence and joy for reading improves.
Create a cozy reading space
Help your child set up an inviting, cozy reading space in your home dedicated to reading. Perhaps you can create a fort made out of pillows with a small seating area inside it. Your child can even decorate it with mini lights and pictures and maybe even keep a flashlight inside it for nighttime reading. Start a ritual that your child can look forward to, where at a certain time each day you crawl into this space with them and read together. Eventually they will likely start to read on their own in this space, finding comfort and joy in this uplifting and cozy spot for reading.
Family time!
When encouraging your child to read more, it’s important that you lead by example. It’s easy for adults to neglect reading and instead spend time on their phones or devices looking at social media or writing emails late into the evening. Instead, create a designated family reading hour – perhaps right before or after dinner or before everyone goes to sleep. During this time, all family members should pick a book or reading material of their choice and gather around a comfortable area. The entire family should read together at the same time. As an added activity, at the end of the reading hour, you can go around and have everyone discuss what they read and why they would or would not recommend it to others. If one hour is too long, try smaller segments, like 30 or 45 minutes, and if every day is too much, try starting with just two or three times per week. The key is making it a fun, comfortable, and consistent experience that your child will look forward to.
Go to the library!
The library is a great place, filled with wonderful books on so many different topics. Take a trip to the library with your child. Let them grab any books that call out to them and spend some time at the library either reading to them or letting them read to themselves. They can even just turn the pages of books and browse the pictures if they aren’t able to read. Let them check out any books they’d like and encourage them to read them at home before returning them and picking out new ones.
Reading is a key skill that affects nearly every aspect of school. The earlier you can foster a love for reading in your child, the more likely they will find confidence and academic success.