Is your young child often disinterested in the books you bring home for them? Do you wish they would develop a love for reading that they could take into middle school and beyond?
Some children love reading, requesting the same books over and over again and giggling with delight each time, while others simply despise sitting down for story time. What makes the difference in these two types of children? No child is born knowing how to read, so where does their interest come from? How do you encourage it?
Like eating and drinking, reading is a daily necessity for every child. Parents should consciously guide and conform to their children’s interest in reading with appropriate reading materials whenever possible. Books should take priority over watching television and playing video games. Professional and systematic training can help children start to love reading, maintain good reading habits, and improve their reading ability.
Teaching Your Child to Read is a guide book for parents looking to get their children, ages 3 to 6, interested in reading. It explains how to help children cultivate reading ability step by step, as well as answers the questions of Why should I? and How do I? when it comes to specific exercises.
I picked this up because I thought, as the title suggested, this would help me teach my child how to read and encourage a love of reading. Instead, this is very much geared for very early childhood development—that stage where we read picture books to our young children. That’s fine! I just didn’t feel like that was clear with this title:
I didn’t really learn anything helpful, but I appreciated the following ideas: — Use the five senses when asking your child open-ended questions about picture books, such as, “What do you think that ice cream tastes like?” — Read at the same time every day so the child knows what to expect and can look forward to it. — Read one-on-one with siblings to encourage a love of reading (because they get to spend time with you!)
Other ideas just didn’t resonate with me. Here are some examples. — Create a checklist and schedule for reading and give immediate rewards when completing a session. — When your child is four, stop reading to them with fun voices and become an “expert” on the subject so you can share all sorts of factoids with your child as you read. And read like a “professional.” — Organize monthly parties for your 5-6 year olds where you invite friends so they can practice storytelling publicly.
Overall, the language was highly academic with a lot of linguistic jargon, which I feel makes it less accessible for parents to read. Ironic, considering the topic of the book.
Very detailed and informative. Aimed towards helping children ages 3-6. I especially loved the summaries at the end of sections to review the main points because there was so much information to take in!