Reading with your child at home

Here are some tips for reading with your child at home:

• Make your child feel like they are an excellent reader all the time! Encourage them by pointing out what they did well and what strategies you saw them using. Celebrate their successes and build their confidence!
• Set your child up for success. Warm up the book by looking at the cover or pictures and predicting what it might be about. Look for difficult words ahead of time and tell your child what they say. You might even read the book (or each passage) at the same time as your child or just before your child attempts it. It's not cheating - reading isn't a test.
• If your child makes a mistake and it makes sense, let it go. Stopping to correct every mistake is frustrating to readers. If it makes sense and doesn't affect the story, there's no harm in ignoring it. Adults make mistakes while reading too.
• If your child makes a mistake that does not make sense: Pause ~ Prompt ~ Praise. It takes time for children to recognize and think about their mistakes - give them lots of time to think it through and try to figure it out on their own (they may read on before self-correcting). If your child asks for help right away, prompt them with "you try it." When you know they are really stuck, ask them an MSV question (see image to the right) and let them try again before giving the answer. Then praise your child for trying hard and/or self-correcting.
• Talk about what's happening in the story. Stop periodically to ask your child questions about what they think, feel, or are learning. Share your opinions too. Articulating and sharing solidifies your thinking.
• Participate in fun reading activities that aren't just about books. Literacy includes all forms of communication. Listen to audio books in the car, play iSpy, have a family game night with board games that require reading, talk about art, and 'read the world' (read recipes, magazines, traffic signs, trading cards, etc... together).
• Read at the same time as your child. Show your child that reading is a life-long, enjoyable leisure activity.