Parents should encourage reading Read any good books lately? What about your child?




Parents should encourage reading
Read any good books lately? What about your child?


If he or she hasn’t taken to books yet, don’t fret. There are a ways to develop a child’s literacy, and instill an appreciation and love for reading.


One of the best ways for parents to spark their children’s interest in reading is to establish regular times each day for sharing books together––beginning in infancy.


Parents should allow children the opportunity to pick out books, encourage them to discuss characters and story plots, and positively reinforce all reading attempts.


Whether parents read stories or make them up, children are developing their imaginations and learning at an early age that reading can be fun.


Incorporating reading into children’s leisure-time activities is very important in developing their interest and involvement in literature. A recent study revealed that more than 50 percent of children prefer watching TV or playing video games as a leisure activity.


To encourage kids to read, parents need to be creative.


For example, parents can develop word games around the house, create a book allowance, attend book fairs, purchase children’s hobby and interest books, subscribe to children’s magazines, surf the Internet together and schedule family visits to the library.


Parents should teach their children that they can read anywhere – even when traveling.


According to the study, only 41 percent of parents encourage their children to read when taking a family vacation.


Parents can urge their kids to read on a family trip by asking them to locate cities and landmarks on the map, read the driving directions, play word games or read a book aloud about the destinations the family will be visiting.


Even if a parent is traveling without children, the parent can read a bedtime story to them over the phone to communicate that reading is an important daily activity.


To learn more tips to encourage children to read and to view a recommended reading list, visit www.firstbook.org, the Website of a national nonprofit organization dedicated to giving children from low-income families the opportunity to read and own their first new books.



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