Reading books with your child is such a wonderful way for them to learn language and concepts to help prepare them for school. However, sometimes it can be difficult to get them involved in reading, here are some tips that might help with making reading more appealing:
- Make your own books
You could try making your own books with some photos that your child is interested in. You could print them out and stick them together or you could make them with an online photo book maker.
- Let then read in their own way
No need to worry if your child only likes to flick through the pages or look at a few pictures, you can always build on this by talking about the key words that they are looking at or making some comments about the content of the book. You don’t have to read every page of the book in one go!
- Act it out
You could include some movement in your reading to make it more interesting e.g. if you are reading a book about a plane then you could pretend to be planes and fly around the room together.
- Link in real experiences
This will help you broaden your child’s vocabulary and understanding of different concepts. e.g. if you are reading about the beach you could talk about a time that you went to the beach together.
- Create a book space
You could make a cosy corner or chair somewhere in the house where your child can get to some books to look through and you could read together. Having this available will help them to learn that reading is something fun that you can do together every day.
These little additions can help reading to become an exciting activity that your child looks forward to doing with you.