Clever Reading: Tips to Develop Strong Reading Skills in Children

“There is no such thing as succeeding without reading,” says Dr. Richard Bavaria, vice president of education at Sylvan Learning Center. “Developing solid reading skills in the early years means children are more likely to become confident learners all throughout school.”

Dr. Bavaria suggests the following tips parents can use to help their children develop strong reading skills:

Pre-School Children

• Set aside time for storytelling. Reading and telling stories together help stimulate reading and writing skills.
• Read aloud. It sparks the imagination and helps orient children to language and the concept of written words. When reading a story aloud, point to the words as you speak them. Follow the sentence with your finger so that children begin to recognize how words appear on the page.
• Read often, but don’t expect to be able to read together for long periods of time.
  Encourage children between ages 4 and 7 to recognize words on the page.

Grade School Children

• Continue to read aloud. Even after children start to read on their own, reading aloud with them can help develop language skills.
• Encourage your child to try to sound out a strange word. Mistakes should be treated as an opportunity to learn a new word, not an embarrassment.
• Encourage talk and discussion as this contributes to the development of language skills and can help with reading. Ask everyone around the dinner table to talk about his or her day or tell a story.
• Introduce children to your local public library and get library cards for everyone in the family. Enroll in library-sponsored programs like reading challenges.
• Check with teachers and librarians to confirm the appropriate reading level for your child’s age. Get recommendations from them on good children’s books, or visit HYPERLINK “http://www.bookadventure.com” www.bookadventure.com to select age-appropriate titles.
• Read newspapers and magazines together. Help them read photo captions.
  Set up or designate shelves in a child’s room for her own “library.”
• Go to the Internet. The Internet can provide many opportunities for children looking for new things to read. Book Adventure is a free Sylvan-created, interactive, reading motivation program that can be found online at www.bookadventure.com. Students choose their own books, take short comprehension quizzes and redeem their accumulated points for small prizes. Book Adventure also offers teachers and parents resources and tips to help children develop a lifelong love of reading.

Sylvan Learning Center offers reading programs that are based upon solid and scientific research, educational industry best practices and common sense. Sylvan’s reading tutors use a systematic, age– and grade–appropriate approach that ultimately fosters reading independence and confidence.

For more great tips, visit www.educate.com.