By now, surely you have heard how incredibly important it is to read to your child as much as possible. I mean, it’s critical. According to Literacy and Reading News, “”Reading aloud to children helps them develop oral language…It teaches them how to listen and how narrative is structured. They also learn vocabulary and how print works and that it is read from left to right.”
Reading to children also helps them develop a love of great stories. But reading isn’t everything. Another key to teaching preschoolers to read is telling them great stories. It’s important for kids to see you use your imagination – to dream up a story from your mind. Better yet, ask them what the story should be about (that also makes it easier), and come up with a fun story based on that. If you don’t like telling stories, or just aren’t very good at it, play “Round Robin”. You start the story with a couple of sentences like “Once upon a time, there was a sweet little girl who lived in a…” – and then let your child continue from there. After a few sentences you say “Round Robin” and then the story passes to the next person (or back to you). You create a story together that can take lots of fun twists and turns, and your child can see how powerful your imagination is for story-telling.
One thing I’ve observed is that kids who have one or two stories read to them each night become accustomed to the immediate gratification of a story that starts and ends in 10 minutes or less. You can help prepare your children for longer books by telling them stories from your imagination that are continued from one night to the next. The first time I did this with my children – started a really exciting story about Bobby, the Intergalactic Dentist – and then stopped abruptly at a very exciting point to say “…and you’ll find out what happens next tomorrow!), my kids nearly fell off the bed with excitement. The next night, they took their baths and brushed their teeth at a record pace to hear the next installment of the story. The story continued for about 3 weeks, and each night they were thrilled and excited. And shortly after, I was able to read them “The Mysterious Benedict Society,” a terrific book with 512 pages that I enjoyed just as much as they did. Even my 4 year old was consumed with the story.
So give it a try – tell a story once in awhile! It’s a great way to get your kids reading.
August 8, 2008 at 5:06 pm
Reading is critical! I just read Proust and The Squid by Maryanne Wolf. It’s a fascinating book about all the work a young child’s brain has to do in order to learn to read fluently. And…telling stories is so important too. It’s one of the many reasons my sister-in-law and I incorporate storytelling and music in all our bilingual Professor Pocket CDs.
August 9, 2008 at 9:29 pm
Thanks for your comment! I hope you weren’t upset by the subject of this posting – and of course I recognize the incredible importance of reading to our kids as much as possible. Just wanted to make sure parents who are teaching preschool children remember how important some other activities are, too! I’ll check out Proust and the Squid!