Get Back to the Books

By: R. Scott Lindsey, Executive Director

Sylvan Learning of Fredericksburg and Stafford (Patch Partner)

Educational experts agree that the more children read, the more they'll enjoy reading, and the better readers they're likely to become. National Education Association’s Read Across America is celebrated on March 2nd and presents a great opportunity to get back to reading. This day marks the culmination of the year-round reading extravaganza of the National Education Association and falls on the birthday of the late Dr. Seuss.

Parents play a key role in fostering a love of reading, even starting as early as sharing picture books with babies. Sylvan Learning, the leading provider of tutoring to students of all ages, grades and skill levels, recommends that parents spend at least one hour per week or 10 to 15 minutes a day reading with their children.

Reading is an important life skill and source of great personal enjoyment. But reading skills and habits develop young, so it's important for parents to encourage their children's love of reading early. Spending an hour a week reading with your children can foster a lifetime of reading.

Sylvan Learning offers the following tips for developing good reading skills:

§ Start the Reading Adventure with Preschoolers.

§ Set aside time for storytelling. Reading and telling stories together helps stimulate reading and writing skills.

§ Read aloud. It sparks the imagination and helps orient children to language and the concept of written words. When reading a story aloud, point to the words as you speak them. Follow the sentence with your finger so that children begin to recognize how words appear on the page.

§ Read often, but don't expect to be able to read together for long periods of time.

§ Encourage children between ages 4 and 7 to recognize words on the page.

§ Read Regularly with Grade School Children.

§ Continue to read aloud. Even after children start to read on their own, reading aloud with them can help develop language skills.

§ Encourage your child to try to sound out a strange word. Mistakes should be treated as an opportunity to learn a new word, not an embarrassment.

§ Encourage talk and discussion as this contributes to the development of language skills and can help with reading. Ask everyone around the dinner table to talk about his or her day.

§ Introduce children to your local public library and get library cards for everyone in the family.

§ Read newspapers and magazines as a family. Help children read photo captions.

§ Set up or designate shelves in children’s rooms to create personal “libraries.”

§ Go to the Internet.

The Internet can provide many opportunities for children looking for new things to read. Book Adventure is a free, Sylvan-created interactive, reading, motivation program that can be found online at www.BookAdventure.com. Students choose their own books from more than 7,500 titles, take short comprehension quizzes and redeem their accumulated points for small prizes. Book Adventure also offers teacher and parent resources and tips to help children develop a lifelong love of reading.

For additional tips on instilling the joy of reading and making learning a fun family endeavor, visit the “Parent Resources” area of www.SylvanLearning.com/us/stafford-va . For more information about Sylvan, call 540-602-2360.