Every Child Ready to Read

By Jean Gullikson, Manager of Children’s Services, Carnegie-Stout Public Library

We all know the importance of being able to read. Reading allows us to be better communicators, to explore new worlds through books and other media, and to achieve higher education levels.

As a parent, there are many activities you need to do with your child to prepare them to learn to read. Early reading skills are developed long before a child enters kindergarten. Starting early makes a huge difference – according to the Public Library Association, there’s nearly a 90% probability that a child will remain a poor reader at the end of fourth grade if a child is a poor reader at the end of first grade. Helping your preschooler to develop the following six early literacy skills will give them the head start they need to succeed.

Print motivation is your child’s interest in and enjoyment of books. Children need to spend quality time with an adult who reads to them each day. Learning that reading and books can be fun instead of a chore will encourage children to want to learn to read. Children will then become good readers by practicing what they enjoy.

Building vocabulary also is key. Telling your children what they are seeing, touching, tasting, smelling, or hearing helps them to learn words and to know how to describe the world around them.

Children who develop letter knowledge will be able to identify the alphabet – not just the “ABC Song,” but individual letters. Children will understand that words are made up of smaller parts. Saying the sounds associated with each letter also is important.

Phonological awareness is a child’s ability to hear and play with the smaller sounds in words. This awareness will help a child to sound out words as they begin to read on their own.

Print awareness is the process of learning how words and books work. Children will learn how to hold a book, how to turn pages, and how to follow writing on a page. They also will become aware that words are all around us.

Your family can have a lot of fun with narrative skills. These are a child’s ability to tell stories or describe events or things around them. These skills help a child understand the flow of a story and to better comprehend what they read.

You can help your child by reading to them, singing songs to them, or saying rhymes with them. None of these activities have to be on a set schedule. In addition to simple storybooks, you can read aloud to a child what you see on street signs or the back of the cereal box. Your children will enjoy songs throughout the day, and you might find that it makes routine chores like bath time, diaper-changing time, or bedtime easier if you have a special song to sing. Your children will be especially tickled if you make up silly rhymes for things you see and do too. Remember you know your child best and they love doing things with you!