Importance of Reading with your children

Learning to read

What we need to know

Reading begins at a very early age when children start to take notice of the print that surrounds them and the talk that includes them. Children begin to engage with reading and writing experiences that attract their attention and interest before they go to school. Children notice street signs and most can recognise a large yellow ‘M’ sign from a kilometre up the road because it benefits them! They pay attention to books they like and often insist on many re-readings of their favourites. They learn quickly to find aps on mobile phones and electronic devices because it benefits them to do so.

Talk is a key to literacy learning. Children need opportunities to interact. Recent research indicates that children are becoming more adept at communicating in the language of commands and demands rather than being competent in extended conversations. I suspect electronic devices may be inhibiting the time parents spend talking with their children. Children need to be included in interactions with significant others and to ensure that happens, electronic devices need to be turned off. Parents need to talk with their children! It is in the context of engaged conversations that children expand their vocabularies, increase their understandings of the world, learn about themselves, and learn the nuances of the language and effective communication.

Let children make decisions about the books they choose to read. This implies that there is a well-stocked and suitable range of books from which to choose. It is essential that there are lots of books in the home and that they are readily available. Create a book-flood by borrowing weekly from the local library, buying from garage sales, finding supermarket specials, making your own, and sharing books in the community.

Look at how books are stored in the home, for example, bookshelves, book boxes, or shoe boxes. Are the books visible or tucked out of sight? Do the children have a bed light to read at night? Keep introducing children to different kinds of books — humorous books, books with beautiful illustrations, rhyming books, pop-up books, electronic books, graphic novels, and factual texts. With your children, visit places such as the local library, markets and bookstores to find books that are interesting and fun to share. The number of books, the care of books, and the storage of books are all messages regarding how books and reading are valued in this household. What message are you marketing?

Building on the diversity of family literacy practices

Families participate in diverse and successful reading and writing practices. The diversity of these practices needs to be recognised and celebrated. For example, when families from different cultural backgrounds share their traditions and passions for storytelling the literacy learning of their children is enhanced. When parents share a book in their first language with their children, they are building the foundations for a positive attitude to reading and expanding on the child’s language skills. When parents and carers just take time to talk about a book, the child benefits.

To accommodate the diversity of home literacy practices, it is essential that parents:

• engage children in many and varied types of literacy experiences not just storybook reading, for example, cooking, newspapers, television information, instructions, street signs, brochures, junk mail, electronic communication, notes, singing, talk, and written communication
• appreciate that different family members, not just parents, play a role in literacy learning, for example grandparents, siblings, extended families
• recognise and celebrate the literacy associated with cultural differences and traditions
• locate resources, for example, interpreters and electronic resources that can assist in decreasing the communication divide and strengthen partnerships between homes and schools.

All parents play a crucial role in supporting their children. Sometimes, parents need reassurance and assistance to find ways to use the skills that they do possess. Focus is on what parents can do; not on what they cannot. Spending quality time interacting with children goes a long way to supporting children’s literacy development.