Articles of Interest!
Wonderful website for fun learning in creative ways!!! Your child will think they are just playing games!!!
Examples:
Posted by Valerie Young in General, Parent
Reading at home is a very important part of a child’s development. It creates a connection between the home and school and allows students the opportunity to practice new reading skills such as fluency and comprehension. Here are a few tips that can help make home reading more effective.
Make Reading A Part Of Your Family Time! Family time is so important… Why not make reading part of this valuable time with your kids?
Here are some tips for integrating reading into our daily family activities:
- Read bedtime stories
- Play a board game
- Visit your local library
- Read a recipe and cook something yummy together!
- Create a comfy reading space in your home.
- Put your child in charge of reading the grocery list at the store.
Choose Books That Are At An Appropriate Reading Level For Your Child
- Use the five finger rule. Open the book to any page and ask your child to read.
- Put up a finger every time your child does not know a word. If you have put up more than five fingers before the end of the page, this book is too hard for your child.
- Choose books that match your child’s likes and interests.
- Keep plenty of reading materials in your home: books, magazines, newspapers, and comic books. Children enjoy having a variety of reading materials!
How To Read With A Beginning Reader:
- Encourage your child to use his/her finger to point to each word.
- Read a sentence and have your child repeat it.
- Take turns reading a sentence each or a page each.
- Talk about the story as you read it. What do you think will happen next? What does this story remind you of? How do you think this character feels?
- Don’t be afraid to read the same book again! Repeated reading helps build reading fluency!
- 15-20 minutes is plenty for a beginning reader!
Check For Understanding
- Start the book by making predictions. What do you think will happen in this story?
- Ask questions and make comments duringthe reading process.
- After reading a book, have your child tell you the events from the story in the correct order.
- What was the problem in this story?
- How did the character feel when…?
- Encourage your child to make connections. Does this story remind you of another book you read, an event in your life, a movie?
Read Books Online! There are many fun and interactive websites for literacy. Here are a few FREE online resources:
http://interactivesites.weebly.com
Teachers- You can also download a printable version to send home with students. This is a great resource for students’ parents!
ScholarsChoice_ReadingAtHome_Printable
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SCIENCE PROVES READING TO KIDS REALLY DOES CHANGE THEIR BRAINS
MRIs provide hard proof.
Catherine Pearson
Senior Reporter, Women and Parents, The Huffington Post
Posted: 08/06/2015 11:16 AM EDT | Edited: 08/06/2015 01:56 PM EDT
Pediatricians often recommend parents routinely read aloud to their young children.
Now, for the first time, researchers have hard evidence that doing so activates the parts of preschoolers' brains that help with mental imagery and understanding narrative -- both of which are key for the development of language and literacy.
"There have been a good number of studies that have [found] empirical evidence that reading to kids does have an impact on things such as literacy and oral language readiness," Dr. Thomas DeWitt, director of the division of general and community pediatrics at Cincinnati Children's Hospital, told The Huffington Post. "But prior to this study, we really have not been able to [answer], 'Does it have an impact biologically on brain function?'"
In the study, which will be published in the August 10 issue of Pediatrics, researchers looked at the brains of 19 3- to 5-year-olds using magnetic resonance imaging, or MRI. Researchers scanned the children's brains while they listened recordings of a woman reading stories, as well as while they listened to background noise, in order to see how their brains responded when faced with different types of stimulation. The team also gathered information about how stimulating the children's home reading environments were, which they assessed by asking about things like how frequently they were read to and whether they were exposed to a variety of books.
The MRIs revealed that children from more stimulating home reading environments had greater activity in the parts of the brain that help with narrative comprehension and visual imagery. Their brains showed greater activity in those key areas while they listened to stories.
"This is a small and very early study, but the exciting thing it was able to demonstrate is that early reading does have an impact on the parts of the brain that are fundamental for developing literacy early on," DeWitt said. "It's biological evidence that transcends empirical studies."
The American Academy of Pediatrics, which publishes Pediatrics, has long been outspoken about the importance of reading at home throughout infancy and early childhood, arguing that it can improve language skills, foster literacy development and help with other less tangible qualities.
"Parents who spend time reading to their children create nurturing relationships, which is important for a child’s cognitive, language and social-emotional development," the AAP has said.
DeWitt said it is yet unclear whether it matters if a child's parent or some other caregiver, say a teacher, regularly reads aloud to them. These are questions he hopes will be tackled in future investigations. It is also important to attempt similar MRI studies with larger samples.
But for now, he said the findings provide exciting biological evidence of what so many parents already know: that reading to their babies and children is important and helps to prime their developing brains.
"Start using books early on with your kids," DeWitt urged. "Reading early -- and often -- is important."