Read to your child

There is strong evidence to support the fact that children who are regularly read to in their early years are more likely to be successful readers at school.

Reading to children lays important foundations for future learning.

Reading helps to build and develop vocabulary and comprehension skills and gives your child an understanding of how language works.

Ten minutes a day is all it takes to get your child off to a great start!

You don’t need to be an expert to read to a child, remember that you are the centre of your child’s universe! They will love any time that you spend with them and benefit from it.

By reading to you child regularly you are giving valuable lessons by:

• Stimulating their imagination
• Reinforcing a love of reading
• Providing a rich language environment
• Strengthening and developing the bond between you and your child
• Providing a strong foundation for their education

Tips for reading together

There is no right or wrong way to read to a child and no rules. All you need is a quiet place, a book, you and your child.

• Try to read every day, even if your child is not showing interest initially
• Use nursery rhymes, action rhymes and songs as well as books.
• Make it fun, use different types of books such as pop ups and ‘lift the flap’ books
• Introduce concepts such as books showing patterns, colours, numbers and letters
• Make it exciting, go fast and slow so that children can begin to predict what is going to happen
• Talk about what is happening, clearly point to things on the page and name them
• Join the library and get involved in storytimes