How to Nurture a Growing Reader
- Read with your child at least once every day.
- Make sure they have plenty to read. Take them to the library regularly, and keep books and other reading materials in their reach.
- Notice what interests your child, then help find books about those things.
- Praise your child's efforts and newly acquired skills.
- Help your child build a personal library. Children's books, new or used, make great gifts and appropriate rewards for reading. Designate a bookcase, shelf or box where your child can keep his/her books.
- Go places and do things with your child to build their background knowledge and vocabulary, and to give them a basis for understanding what they read.
- Tell stories. It's a fun way to teach values, pass on family history and build your children's listening and thinking skills.
- Be a reading role model. Let your children see you read, and share some interesting things with them that you have read about in books, newspapers or magazines.
- Continue reading aloud to older children even after they have learned to read by themselves.
- Encourage writing along with reading. Ask children to sign their artwork, add to your shopping list, take messages and make their own books and cards as gifts.
These tips were taken from the Reading is Fundamental website.
