Importance of Reading to Children and How to Start

Young children soak in practically everything in their environments. Even if your child is just 5 to 6 months old, try reading a book around them, or you can even buy some picture books. Whatever you will be speaking around them, they will hear and try to imitate you. Reading to your child at any age will boost their brain development, emotional development and so much more.

Benefits of reading to children

Do know that behind every children’s vocabulary building process, the major contribution is by the parent’s side itself. so here are few benefits

Creates a lifetime interest in reading.

If you start reading while they are young, they will develop the habit of reading for lifelong. They are more likely to persist in learning to read and associate reading with happy memories.

Reading to young children extends their attention spans

Reading aloud helps them develop key concentration and self-discipline skills. As listening to story will help them develop their memory retention skills and creates a longer attention span. Th attention span will help a child perform better both in school subjects and in real-life projects.

Reading to children aids in language development.

As children listen to you read, they pick up correct word pronunciation and proper grammar. Their working vocabulary increases as the books you read often contain new words you might not otherwise use in your everyday communications. All these skills will eventually help them become a a more fluent reader.

Strengthen imagination and their creativity skills

As you read to your children, they visualize the events and situations that are outside of their own personal experiences. Kids often start thinking out of the box after reading variety of fictions and nonfiction books based on dinosaurs, bugs, and airplanes. They are usually more adept at creating stories from their own imaginations.

Reading time is great one-on-one bonding time.

Reading aloud is a wonderful chance for you and your child to connect. It’s a nice way to share adventure, intrigue, and emotion—spend time together and slow down during an otherwise hectic day. Nothing can replace this quality time spend with each other.

Tips to develop reading habit in children

So, here are some tips you can use to build a reading habit for your children –

Allow your little one to choose a book – 

When you allow your little one to choose a book, they will become an active participant in the reading process. Keep a few books on the shelf and help them choose a book to read. To help them stay attracted and engaged, keep the book cover’s facing forward.

Words aren’t essential –

Picture books without any words are the ideal books to keep little ones engaged. Whenever you will point out colours or shapes to them, they will make up a story of their own, and all these will increase their imagination power.

Start with short and colorful books

Children have very short attention limits, hence choose a book that is short enough to keep them attentive for a long period. If your child wants to read different books at once, just go for it and don’t force them at all.

Get into character

If you’re reading dialogue or comic books, give each character a unique voice. Get as silly as you can and make things more fun to sound. You can make voices like “BOOM!” or “ZOOM!” and give voice to actions.

Don’t stop reading even if they get older – 

Just because your kid can read everything now, you should not stop reading around them. Try variations and different methods to engage.

Explain new words to them easily- 

Whenever you come across a unique word you think your little one hasn’t heard for a long, ask them its meaning. And if at all they fail to tell it, help them to understand the meaning. Initially they might not get it, but using and adding it to everyday vocabulary can work like wonder!

Choosing books for Reading

You need to keep your toddler’s interest by choosing books topics that you know your child will like and those with familiar or repetitive text so they can fill in words.

For younger toddlers (12–24 months):

• Choose sturdy board books with pictures showing their daily routines. Books about bedtime or mealtime or books about saying hello or good-bye. You can even try books with textures to feel and lift-the-flap pages.

For older toddlers (24–36 months):

• It’s time to move beyond board books as they are starting to turn paper pages. They like books that are repetitive and easy to memorize so that they. You can invest on books about children, families, and animals. scrapbooks, or photo albums full of people. Poetry and songbooks are also good choice as you may find that story time turns into sing-along time .

You can also borrow books from kids’ library as letting them choose their own books can be a fun adventure. Plan an exciting trip to the library and explore the whole new world of books. Though the current scenario doesn’t allow us but hopefully we will resume our normal life.

With your help, your children can begin a lifelong relationship with the books, so they grow into adults who love reading and enjoy this printed world for knowledge or pleasure.

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