Reading a book to your child every day is the best investment you can do with your child. Helping the child inculcate the habit of reading and falling in love with books is what will take him or her a long way.
Introduce your kids to the mesmerizing world of books. It simply changes their attitude and aptitude. As a kid my parents introduced me to books at a very early age and I fell in love with reading books immediately. The love affair still continues .
I now see my brother doing the same to my nephew’s. Both the boys are just 4 years old and have a habit of being read story books before sleeping, no matter what. They even have their favourite story books.
Does your child have a favorite book they want to read over and over again? Or worse, wants you to read over and over again?
I bet you don’t even have to read the text while holding the book, since you remember it by heart. (There’s one that I have memorized since my nephew chooses only me to read it out to him time & again!)
You had spent a great time choosing the book from the bookshop, but now you’ve grown to hate it. You might even wish it would disappear forever. I feel your pain.
I know it can be maddening, but before you think you are done with this particular book, you may want to reconsider. Despite its repetitive reading it offers a number of benefits for new readers.
When a child hears the same story multiple times, they become familiar and comfortable with a greater number of words. There are chances that text that you’ve memorized your child has too, and that’s a good thing. I realised this when I saw my nephew flipping the pages of his Peppa Pig book and saying the story as well. He still can’t read.
This is the best way for vocabulary enrichment. Kids understand that there are different ways of expressing a similar situation as well as the are different words which mean the same. It’s a pleasure to see them then use these words in general conversation. My nephew’s now make up situations just in order to use the new vocabulary they learn every day.
They took my aunt by a surprise the other day when they came running from the other room saying, “The room is too dark and I think there is a troll under the bed”. When they don’t want to understand what we are telling them, they look at us and say, “We can’t understand what you are saying as you are taking gibberish“. It’s amazing to hear kids use the vocabulary that they have heard/read from a book.
Each time your child hears a book read to them, he or she learns more about the story itself. Every time they go through the text or illustrations, it allows them to dive deeper into the story’s meaning, preparing them for more complex narratives down the road.
With fluency and comprehension comes greater reading confidence. Children who can follow a story, will never stumble over words and are more likely to enjoy reading.
Knowing that repetitive reading is good for your kids may not make reading the same book the thousandth time any easier, but maybe it’ll help your child learn to cherish books for life!
-Divya Joshi
