Encouraging and Reinforcing the Love of Reading to our Children.

Encouraging and Reinforcing the Love of Reading to our Children.

Would you believe me if I told you that I NEVER went to a library or a bookstore as a child? When I was little, taking a trip to the local library was not a thing! I did not even know if there was one anywhere near where I lived. My wonderful mom had the opportunity to stay home with me and she took it upon herself to begin my education. However, the only times in which we would go to actually buy books was during the ‘back to school’ time in the summer!

I remember loving going to the library store with her to get my books for the school year! However, besides textbooks, I didn’t have that experience of picking a book for leisure reading. I would see her reading at least an hour a day but I never really did it myself. 

I also saw my best friend reading for leisure constantly. To me, that was not normal! It wasn’t until I was an adult that I started vising bookstores, and to be honest the first book I loved was Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone! 

Then I became an elementary teacher and I discovered the world of picture books!!! And booooy do I love them!! Those are my favorite books! I love the colors, the pages, the stories!! As I teacher I would see the real benefit of taking kids to the library to pick books and noticing the difference when you have students who read constantly and those who unfortunately don’t. the difference is enormous!

So, the point of my life anecdote is that reading as a child and instilling that love for reading is so incredibly important!! Children’s minds are little sponges that want to learn ands process everything! They find themselves discovering the world through pages. 

Give your kids the gift of books and sit with them to discover that world together. Take them to the bookstore, over to the children’s section and let them pick books that pique their interest. If that is not possible, allow them to find books online! There are many website and applications that support the world of reading! Some of these may be vooks.com,  getepic.com, readingeggs.com, abcmouse.com, magicblox.com, read.gov, childrenslbrarylady.com among many others.

Encourage your children to read at least 20 minutes each day. This will allow your children to grow their vocabulary exponentially! Research says that a student who reads 20 minutes per day is exposed to over 1.8. million words in a year and can score approximately 90^th percentile on standardized tests. 

This gives them the opportunity to understand text, to develop fluency, to inquire, to establish relationships within the text, to compare, to contrast, to predict, to infer, to recall events, and many other cognitive abilities. 

The benefits of reading every day are endless. So, get your child immersed in the world of print, in the world of literature!

Love,

Suhaily