Jenny Rich
Level: Basic

Jenny Rich is a licensed reading specialist who worked as a teacher in the New York City public schools. She is now a stay-at-home mom ... ...

Encourage children to speak and to listen - As children grow, they use language to make up stories, to talk about their days, to ask questions and to give information. They listen to others in order to gather information, to get directions and to hear stories, poems and songs. Both listening and speaking are critical as children develop into readers - they lay the foundation for living a literate life and teach children that words carry meaning. This understanding of words will be carried from the spoken word to the written word.

Read aloud - Read to your children as often as possible. There is no shortage of what you can read. Stories, poems, newspaper articles, food labels, street signs... all provide children with the sense that words convey meaning and that people read all of the time for lots of different reasons. When reading stories together, create a special place and time - read before bed each night, or first thing in the morning. Snuggle together and enjoy the conversations that excellent stories inspire.

Model reading - As you know, young children copy what they see their parents do. If you read, your children will want to read as well. You don't have to be a book lover, you can read the newspaper each morning, a monthly sports magazine, internet articles - whatever it is that genuinely interests you.

Keep books accessible - Sure, books belong on book shelves in your children's rooms, but they can also be stashed in lots of different places around your house. Keep your cookbooks on a counter in your kitchen, keep children's nonfiction about building castles and bridges near the blocks in the playroom, keep magazines on the coffee table and poems and song lyrics near your children's musical instruments. Baskets of books next to chairs and inside kid's play areas are fantastic - books stay organized and are accessible when kids want or need them.

Help your children have a balanced reading diet - Simply put, this means encourage your kids to read a wide variety of materials for lots of different purposes. Your children do not have to read "serious fiction" all of the time, nor should they read only nonfiction books about the civil war or one comic book after another. Kids need to take breaks from what they usually read and try new things. Poetry, fiction and nonfiction should be staples in every child's reading diet. And "snack books" are important, as well. Snack books are those silly, light books that you read, as an adult, after an intense, deep novel. Kids need this, too! Their snack books may be silly stories or joke books. Variety is key when helping kids learn to love reading.

Have the next book ready - Many readers have gotten stuck with what to read next. Having nothing to read becomes the great excuse for not reading and the habit of reading can quickly become broken. Children of all ages, even big kids, often need some guidance when it comes to picking a good book. Search for books by authors your child enjoys, find books in the same genre, or find something radically different that you are passionate about to share with your child. If nothing else, have the latest edition of Sports Illustrated Kids or Cricket ready to go. Your recommendation may not be an overwhelming success, but it is a start for stuck readers!

Talk about reading -You read for your own pleasure or to get information and you read with your children. But do you talk about your reading? On rainy days, do you tell your children how excited you are to curl up with a cup of tea and the latest book by your favorite author? Do you count down the days until a great book is published? Do you share your latest acquisitions with your children? You should. Be clear and specific and very, very obvious when it comes to explaining to kids that you, too, are a reader.

Choose books that are just right for your child - Books come with recommended ages on them. Ignore those recommendations, or use them only as a loose guideline. If your child is not one who has an interest in sitting down with a long historical novel, don't force her to read it because you think she should or because her younger cousin read it. Reading levels and reading interests vary from child to child. Reading a book that is too hard will turn kids off. If you want them to be exposed to a book that they can't read on their own, read it to them. A chapter each night before bed will expose them to wonderful new worlds and become a great shared experience for the two of you!

Encourage... but don't push! - As you know, the more you push your children to do something, the less they'll want to do it. Reading is no different. Forcing your children to sit each night (especially over the summer) and read for 30 minutes will turn a fun, engaging activity into a chore - the exact opposite of what you want to happen! Instead, offer to read with your children each night, help them find books or magazines that genuinely interest them and keep a conversation open about how wonderful reading can be.

Praise what your child can do well - Yes, it's easy to listen to your child read and notice that he's struggling to read clearly or to decode longer words. And it's easy to see when your child pushes her books away in favor of other activities. Look past that, though, and notice the reading skills, strategies and interests that your child does possess. If your toddler knows to turn the pages but holds the book upside down, get excited that the pages are moving the right way. If your kindergarten reader knows that the words on the page should match the pictures he sees and makes up a story to go along with the images, fantastic! If your fifth grader takes a very long time to read a book but stays engaged and curious for the duration, he's learning to stick with it and follow a reading interest - the fluency will come.

Jenny Rich is a licensed reading specialist who worked as a teacher in the New York City public schools. She is now a stay-at-home mom and the editor of the children's literacy website http://www.EthansBookshelf.com Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Jenny_Rich