Nothing beats curling up with a good book, except perhaps inspiring that love in your little one. Impart something special to your son or daughter by encouraging them to pick up a book and fall in love with storytelling. With these tips, not only can you help them grow in confidence in their reading abilities, but maybe even make the most stubborn of readers find something they enjoy reading, too.
Introduce Bedtime Stories
Reading to your child even as a baby has great effects on their development. Not only does it offer great bonding time but allows them to hear your voice and develops their ability to listen. Even if you introduce it when your child is a bit older, it adds structure to their bedtime routine, calms them down ready to go to sleep and gives them something to look forward to and get involved with each night. Family life can be frantic between working parents, school and nursery, but this allows time dedicated to being together as a family and gives them positive connotations of the act of reading.
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Choose Collections of Stories & Buy Together
By choosing a series or collection of books by the same authors, you can familiarize your child with characters and author styles that they’ll feel comfortable returning to. Places like The Works and the Book People allow you to buy book bundles and childhood collections like Winnie the Pooh or Beatrice Potter. Browse using money saving websites like Discount Promo Codes for deals and you can save on these sometimes-pricey collections. Do it together with your child to allow them to choose what they want to read. Not only does this encourage them to read the titles and descriptions of books, but they’ll also enjoy the novelty of screen time, swiping on your device.
Make Time to Practice Reading
If your child’s disinterest in reading is related to struggling, make time to practice and read together. Being in the comfort of their own home will hopefully mean they feel at ease and won’t feel embarrassed like they may in a school environment. Ultimately it prevents them from suffering in silence and gives you both valuable one on one time.
Don’t Just Read Books
No matter how much you love books, you may have to face facts that they’re just not destined to be a book lover. However regular reading is still a key part to their education. Luckily there are a number of other ways you can introduce reading that will seem more like a fun treat. Buy them magazines to suit their age range and interests, or if they love sports allow them to read the sports section of the newspaper. It’s also important to not only put emphasis on fiction story books, but also other genres. Do they like dinosaur stories? Get them a book with history and facts about dinosaurs in addition to fun books like “Don’t Ask A Dinosaur“, a brand new book by Deborah Bruss & Matt Forrest Esenwine that will be released April 17th!
Introduce Some Tough Love
This may seem cruel, but it could be just the thing to get them eager to keep turning pages. Pick a book for their reading skill that they’ll love, read them a chapter and leave them wanting more. If they want to read on and find out what happens, they’ll have to pick it up and find out for themselves. In the instance that they’re not a strong reader, you can always alternate chapters. It’s also a great idea to give them books they can read to their younger siblings like picture books. Although below their own skill set, this promotes reading aloud, practicing and even helps with their abilities to be an engaging storyteller.
Make Visits to the Library & Bookshop
Surrounding them with books and being enthusiastic about them yourself will hopefully inspire and create a similar passion in your child. Ensure you make lots of exciting visits to the library and bookshops to choose out books as a family. Make it an adventure and let them take their time pulling out and reading lots of books before making final choices. This gives them license to find books they like the look of and give them a sense of responsibility, which will make them feel grown up.
Reread Books
This is especially essential in your younger readers, although you’ll likely find them drawn to their favorites anyway. No matter how bored you get of reading Elmo or The Gruffalo, rereading books to children is one of the best ways to familiarize them with a story and words, beginning their development to go on and learn to read themselves. Create excitement around new additions to their bookshelf, but always return to those stories you know. Ensure they’re always the one to choose what they have for their bedtime story, too. A hugely popular bedtime story for kids ages 3-5 right now is Thelma The Unicorn by Aaron Blabey.
Instate Fun Reading Rules
What does a child want more than to stay up late? They rarely go to bed obligingly and are always keen to stay up with the adults. By instating a rule that allows them to stay up a bit later for reading, you’re promoting reading as something that gains cool privileges and makes them feel grown up. Reading before bed is also a great way to ensure a good night’s sleep and you’ll likely find they’ll drift off quickly as their eyes grow tired.
There are a number of great ways to promote a love of reading in your child. These, in turn, push you to take out time to help with your child’s education and, furthermore, spend quality time as a family. It provides a great day out at the library or bookshop and treats can turn into something more educational and helpful in their development with magazines and books. With so many benefits, it would be silly not to encourage a love of books in your child.
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