Ways to help your child with their reading

1) Talk about the book – can they find the front cover, the title, the first page etc? 2) Read the book to them, pointing to each word as you read to help them understand that each word has a space before the next one. 3) Can they retell the story to you after you have read it to them? Ask them questions as you go along and at the end of the book to assess their understanding and help them to follow the storyline. 4)Get them to ‘read’ the story to you, using the pictures to guide them. How much could they remember? Could they use ‘storybook’ language?

Ask them what they think could happen next in the story Ask them what they think could happen next in the story. Can they make up their own story around the characters and storyline? Maybe they would like to make their own book, drawing pictures to tell the story. 2) Get them to point to the words as you read them, so that they get used to the idea that we read left to right and start at the top of the page and move down. 3) Help your child to read the story by getting them to sound out the words. Some words will just need to be learnt as they cannot be worked out this way, but many can be read through children applying their phonic knowledge.