Why is reading important for infants and young children?
Reading aloud and sharing stories with your child is a great way to spend time together. Reading and storytelling also help promote language, literacy and brain development. Research also proves that children who enjoy reading do better at school in all subjects. Sharing stories, talking and singing every day helps your child’s overall development in a number of ways. Reading and sharing stories can:
- help your child become familiar with sounds, words, language and the value of books
- spark your child’s imagination, stimulate curiosity and help his/her brain development
- help your child learn the difference between ‘real’ and ‘make-believe’
- help your child understand change and new or frightening events, and also the strong emotions that can go along with them
- help your child develop early literacy skills like the ability to listen to and understand words.
Just by looking at books with your child, you can be a great storyteller and a good model for using language and books. Your child will learn by watching you hold a book the right way and seeing how you move through the book by gently turning the pages. Reading stories with children has benefits for grown-ups too. The special time you spend reading together promotes bonding and helps to build your relationship. This is important for your child’s developing social and communication skills.
At Ekya Schools we inculcate the habit of reading right from the Early Years, in Kindergarten and Montessori. There is a lot of focus on reading in the library, at the storytelling sessions and puppetry classes. For primary, middle and senior school, there is a designated reading week during which there are activities like Book Reviews, D-E-A-R (Drop Everything and Read) and Mystery Readers being conducted annually. The English Language Program at Ekya also offers a wide range of texts from all genres to further the interests of the students and encourage them to delve deeper into the richness of the language.
As a parent, there is no more important activity for preparing your child to succeed as a reader than reading aloud together. Fill your story times with a variety of books. Be consistent, be patient, and watch the magic work. We have compiled a set of reading tips that can help parents of
Infants
Toddlers
Kindergarteners
First Graders
Take a look and happy reading!
