Five Benefits of Reading to Your Child

Five Benefits of Reading to Your Child

I often receive calls from frantic parents who are looking for ways to help their children become better readers.  When I make the simple suggestion to read aloud to the child each day for twenty minutes, some parents give a look as though they are offended that I assumed they were not already reading with their child.  I have concluded that many parents are embarrassed to admit that they are not regularly reading with their child. I do not fault those parents who do not regularly read to their children. Some parents are unable to do this because barriers such as work schedule and other responsibilities do not permit them to do so. There are also those who are unaware of the important role that reading to their child plays in the child’s growth and development. There are many organizations that promote the act of reading to children, but these organizations do not do a good job of explaining the importance and the benefits of reading to children.  Parents should read to their children daily for a minimum of twenty minutes.  Children who are read to benefit in many ways.  Below are five ways that children benefit when parents read to them.

1.    Reading to children helps build vocabulary and language skills.

Literacy development begins long before children enter school.  The quest for literacy begins at birth. As children grow, they use their environment to build their oral language vocabulary.  Research has shown that vocabulary is not learned through direct instruction.  Vocabulary is learned through exposure to language. By age three, children have acquired an oral language vocabulary of about 1,000 words.  By age five or six, students may have 5,000 or more words in their oral language vocabulary. The major influence on the size of a child’s vocabulary is the quantity and quality of the exposure they have had with oral language. Reading aloud is an effective way to develop oral language and expose children to the high quality oral language needed to build their vocabularies. Reading aloud to children teaches them new words and concepts. Children who are read to have highly developed language skills, larger vocabularies and are able to communicate more effectively.

2.  Reading to children builds the experiential background knowledge necessary for comprehension skills.

For a moment, think of the human brain as a file cabinet that stores memories, experiences and knowledge.   These files keep the knowledge that we have acquired organized in the human brain.  These organized knowledge files are called schema.  When we have to comprehend or understand a concept, we have to rely on the schema or experiential knowledge we have stored to make sense of the concept.  If we have no stored schema for a concept, our brain naturally develops one that will be stored with our other knowledge files.  As we learn more and have more experiences, we are constantly refining and altering the knowledge we have stored.  As you read to children, they are constantly activating prior knowledge, constructing new knowledge and refining and expanding prior knowledge.   Reading to children allows them to build the experiential knowledge necessary to have good reading comprehension skills.    

3.   Reading to children helps develop thinking skills.

Being read to and discussing books builds thinking skills.  The quality of the child’s thinking skills is determined by the quality of discussions and questions presented to the child as they read with their parent.   While reading to the child, parents should ask open-ended questions that require the child to make inferences, draw conclusions and express their thoughts and understanding of the book or concept.  Parents should be sure to include non-fiction books in their child’s library.  Reading non-fiction books in addition to fictional stories, helps develop students understanding and thinking skills.

4.  Reading to children helps them develop a sense of story.

Reading to children aids in developing a sense of story.  The term “sense of story” simply means that the reader understands the types of language that is used in stories and as well as story elements such as plot, setting and characters.  As children are read to regularly, they become familiar with story elements and are able to better comprehend and retell the stories.   As they develop their sense of story, they are able to create and write their own stories.

5. Reading to children provides pleasant association with books.

If you were to ask the average child or adult about reading, many would respond that they dislike reading.  Many people associate reading with tasks that they dislike.  Many people only read for academic purposes (reading for school assignments) rather than recreational purposes (reading for enjoyment).  Reading to children helps children have positive association with books and encourages recreational reading.  Research shows that recreational reading improves literacy skills.  As children are read to regularly, they begin to have a love for reading and stories.  Children who are read to will less likely look at reading as a negative and cumbersome task.  Children who are read to, can readily tell you their favorite book and are more likely to develop interest in topics they have learned about through books that have been read aloud to them. 

Written by

Brandi Steagall

Nia Educational