Parent Tips: Literacy Building Tips for Using Read-Alouds with Young Children

By the beginning of second grade, it is estimated that children should be able to identify and read 1,000 words. As school curriculum increases in intensity, it is more impor tant now than ever to foster literacy from a very early age in order for children to become independent readers and learners. Parents want the best for their kids, but with the stresses of everyday modern life, many parents are either sacrificing the benefits of read-aloud time with their children or feel clueless as to how to support a child's early literacy. Here are a few literacy building tips which are sure to help your child get a head start on reading while having fun!

To keep your child grounded in literacy, reading to your child 10 to 30 minutes daily will, in the long run, improve their comprehension and vocabulary. Beck and Mckeown (2001) note that reading aloud is key to developing comprehension skills so children can connect ideas within and beyond the text, use their background knowledge and guess unknown vocabulary.

But this is not the only consideration. Reading is an accrued skill. All human beings are pleasure-oriented; they only do repeatedly what they like! So, if a child finds more pleasure than pain in reading, he/she will keep doing it! We must build pleasure bridges between books and children so they will keep reading over and over.

Reading aloud also increases fluency as parents and caregivers model for students what fluent, meaningful reading is like (Rasinski & Padak, 2001) and they can give children an enjoyable experience. The main purpose is to model enthusiasm when reading good story and by using several criteria, you can develop in students a love of reading and books.

It's better to understand the concept of a read-aloud visually. Envision a huge bowl filled with water that is pouring out into three smaller bowls. The huge bowl is Listening Vocabulary. The first small bowl is Speaking Vocabulary. If we "pour" enough words into childrens' ears, the first levy to breach is Speaking - their spoken vocabularies will fill up!

The second bowl is reading vocabulary, and the third is Writing Vocabulary, in that order. So as long as children continue to hear a lot of words, their speaking, reading, and writing vocabularies will fill up, as well.

When we understand this concept, then we can understand how a 6-year-old may be a beginning reader, but he/she is definitely not a beginning listener! So books that are meant to be early readers are really below the capability of a child to understand. A Dr. Seuss book such as Hop on Pop has, by design, only 200 some words in it. One sample page says: "ALL FALL - We ALL FALL.) A young child may be able to read it, but it is frankly, beneath his/her ability to hear and understand. Why then, would we insult a child's intelligence by reading something like that to a 6 year old? The implication is this: choose read-aloud books that are on a par with a children's listening vocabulary, not their speaking, reading, or writing vocabulary.

To encourage you to do this, try doing the following three things to model reading and motivate them:

1. Read your favorite stories. Some books I read to my five year old go way back to my childhood but many are newer titles.

2. Reach beyond your students' comfort zone. As Rasinski says, "think of books that students may not pick up on their own because they're difficult or unfamiliar. By reading such books to students, you expose them to more sophisticated words, sentences, content, and ideas, which builds their vocabulary and comprehension skills. Be sure to include the very best books in various genres" (Rasinski, 2003). Again, I read historical fiction, biography, science fiction and fantasy, poetry, and folk tales .

3. Make connections. As Rasinski says, "try to find books that connect to life in your classroom and to other texts students may be reading or experiencing (Hartman & Hartman, 1993).

The most important thing is to have fun and let creativity rule!

Promoting early literacy is not limited to the home alone - there are gradual ways to enrich a child's world of reading. Parents and caregivers can show their young readers how to do this in a way that is enjoyable and beneficial to all.Hopefully, you will notice a great difference in your child's ability to simply pick up a book for pure enjoyment. So make those reading moments count.

Further Reading

Beck, I.L., & McKeown, M.G. (2001). Text talk: Capturing the benefits of read-aloud experiences for young children. The Reading Teacher, 55, 10-20.

Hartman, D.K., & Hartman, J.A. (1993). Reading across texts: Expanding the role of the reader. The Reading Teacher, 47, 202-211.

Rasinski, T.V., & Padak, N.D. (2001). From Phonics to Fluency: Effective Teaching of Decoding and Reading Fluency in the Elementary School.New York: Longman.