Supporting Your Child with their Reading

What is my Role? Reading Recovery Teacher Nurture Group Teacher Reading Manager

Why is Reading Important? Children who read more, achieve more Reading is a vital life skill Reading is the basis for all good communication

Early Reading Skills These can be taught by you before school age! Babies learn about the world around them by looking around in any direction. Reading in English is from the left to right and this needs to be learnt. Bring your child’s attention to the print by saying “Let’s read, where do we start?” Run your finger under the text while you read

When your child begins to Read... Always Walkthrough the book first. This will de-bug it for them and make the experience less stressful! Ask.. Where’s the front cover/title? Is it a Fiction (story)/Non-Fiction (information) book? Who are the characters? What do you think the book will be about? What will happen in the beginning/middle/end? Discuss the pictures first while you scan the text and ask questions which will draw out the vocabulary on the pages. Ask your child to find any unusual vocabulary/tricky words before they read the book. Now they are ready to go back and start to read!

What we expect early Readers to do for themselves... Hold the reading book Turn the pages. Point at the text as they read to match their spoken words (early readers only). You can say... “Read it with your finger”.

If your child makes a mistake... Try not to jump straight in with the answer, tempting though it is! Count to ten and give them time to think for themselves. Prompt them to think for themselves by saying... Did that sound right? (they may not have realised-you read it again with your child’s error) Does that look right? E.g. They say “tree” and the word is “plant”. Bring their attention to the first letter in the word, then run their finger slowly across the word. If they forget to read an ending e.g. They say “run” instead of “runs” or “running”. Point and say “read to the end of the word”.

More Prompts! “Go back and try that again!” “Can you see something that could help you?” (pictures-they’re there for a reason!) “Do you know a word that starts like that/what could it be?” “You made a mistake in this sentence, see if you can find it and put it right.” “Make it sound like talking” (helps with phrasing and fluency). Are you listening to yourself?

Lots of Praise! Go back over the book and point out what they did really well, chances are they’ll do it again! Say... “I really liked the way you read that part” (expression, question voice, bold text) “You put that right all by yourself” (self correction) “You remembered how to read that tricky word!”

If your child is reluctant to read... Negotiate the reading, agreeing to read a page each. By doing this you are modelling what good reading sounds like and helping to keep the flow of the story. If the text is too difficult, then read it for them and let their teacher know! Don’t let it become a stressful experience. The time won’t have been wasted, you’ve modelled it for them! You can always ask them questions afterwards to check their understanding.

Reading at home should be... Relaxing! Enjoyable and fun! A chance for your child to show off what they have learnt! A chance for you and your child to spend quality time together! Chances to read other kinds of text! Never miss opportunities to read other texts e.g. Comics, T.V guides, cereal packets, signs outside in your local environment, instructions to play a game, recipes

Finally... Remember this... You may have tangible wealth untold, Caskets of jewels and pots of gold, Richer than I you will never be, I had a parent who read to me!

Thank You! Thank You for attending, we hope that you have found this session useful! Your feedback is really important! Please help yourself to a prompt sheet if you feel that it would be helpful!