Helping Your Child Become a Strong Reader
Ask the Experts by Julie Bellovich
Q. How can I help my child become a reader?
A. Learning to read and write is a critical component to a child's success in school and in life. However, it is important to realize that reading involves a lot more than just sitting down with a good book.
If you want to help your preschool aged child become a strong reader then you need to expose him/her to all areas of literacy. Whether you are the parent of a young child or someone who loves a young child give, him or her, the gift of a lifetime - foster the love of books and create an environment immersed with language, reading and writing activities.
Whether a child is at home or in an early childhood education setting, he/she can and should learn the foundational skills needed for later school achievement. Early language and literacy development is critical to the development of later conventional literacy skills, such as decoding, oral reading, fluency, reading comprehension, writing and spelling.
There are two components to early language and literacy development: verbal language - which incorporates listening, speaking and vocabulary; and literacy - which is the act of extracting meaning from printed symbols including literature and print awareness and the writing process. Combined, these early learning skills are precursors to creating successful readers, writers and spellers in elementary school. The intention of this article is not to impress that you must teach your child to read, but rather quite the opposite.
As your child's first and most important teacher you have the ability to immerse him/her in an atmosphere that is saturated with opportunities to build oral language, create a love of reading and become "print aware" all while having fun! Later reading success depends on us as parents and early educators to lay the groundwork of emergent literacy.
Where does one begin?
- Be a model of reading: read to your child, read to yourself, make reading materials readily available, build a home library, go to the library, set aside family time for reading, read predictable books and let your child fill in the ending.
- Be a language detective with your child: be a good listener, ask open-ended questions, label your environment, talk about your environment, discover new and interesting words, talk about your experiences together.
- Play language games: sing songs, sing the ABC's, create rhyming games that help your child pay attention to sounds in words, have your child fill in the rhyming word to finish your sentence.
- Create a print rich environment: label familiar toys or items in your child's bedroom or playroom with the written word (door, books, bed, window, etc.) Empower your child with a sense of reading success by finding how many words he/she can already read in the community ( the stop sign, Cheerios, Crest, peanut butter, McDonald's - you will be amazed!)
- Create opportunities where your child is encouraged to write and draw.
Reading and writing support one another and when you write down your child's words or let him "write /draw" a letter he/she can begin to make the connection that writing is the spoken word on paper. When a child is exposed to reading and language rich experiences at a young age, he or she is more easily able to make the symbol/language connection necessary for reading success.
As stated so eloquently by Gabriela Mistral
"Many things we need can wait. The child cannot. Now is the time his bones are formed, his mind developed. To him we cannot say tomorrow, his name is today!"
Julie Bellovich, M.Ed., has been teaching since 1987 - 9 years in the Detroit Public Schools and the rest in Grosse Pointe as a resource room teacher, a special education preschool teacher and now an early intervention specialist. She is a product of the Grosse Pointe Schools, Michigan State University - Bachelors, Wayne State University - Masters and Marygrove College - Post Masters. Julie is a second generation employee of the Grosse Pointe Schools and is currently the Early Intervention Specialist at Barnes Early Childhood Center. She can be reached at 313.432.3871.
Save The Date
'Making a Successful Transition into Kindergarten' presented by The Family Center
Wednesday, February 1, 2012 6:30-8:30pm - Panel presentation followed by Q&A session, starts promptly at 6:30pm Barnes Early Childhood Center, 20090 Morningside Dr., Grosse Pointe Woods.
Fee $5 per family
This annual winter school transition program will feature a panel of experts - followed by an open Q & A panel discussion.
Julie Bellovich will be one of the panelists for this special Ask the Experts presentation that will be offered to help preschoolers prepare for kindergarten.
Register online at www.familycenterweb.org or contact The Family Center, 313.432.3832.
Over a Decade of Commitment to Community Families Since 2000
The Family Center serves as the community's hub for information, resources and referral for both families and professionals. The Family Center is a non-profit organization founded to promote a deeper understanding of the role of parents and others in supporting our youth to become competent, caring and responsible community members.
All gifts are tax-deductible.
To volunteer or contribute, visit www.familycenterweb.org, call (313) 432.3832.
Email:
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or write to: The Family Center
20090 Morningside Drive, Grosse Pointe Woods, MI 48236.
