Reading Tips for Parents of Kindergartners
By: Reading Rockets
Play with letters, words, and sounds! Having fun with language helps your child learn to crack the code of reading. The tips below offer some fun ways you can help your child become a happy and confident reader. Try a new tip each week. See what works best for your child.
By: Reading Rockets
Play with letters, words, and sounds! Having fun with language helps your child learn to crack the code of reading. The tips below offer some fun ways you can help your child become a happy and confident reader. Try a new tip each week. See what works best for your child.
- Talk to your child, ask your child to talk about his day at school. Encourage him to explain something they did, or a game he played during recess
- Sing songs, read rhyming books, and say silly tongue twisters. These help kids become sensitive to the sounds in words.
- Read it and experience it. Connect what your child reads with what happens in life. If reading a book about animals, relate it to your last trip to the zoo.
- Use your child's name, point out the link between letters and sounds. Say, "John, the word jump begins with the same sound as your name. John, jump. And they both begin with the same letter, J."
- Play language games with puppets. Have the puppet say, "My name is Mark. I like words that rhyme with my name. Does park rhyme with Mark? Does ball rhyme with Mark?"
- Have your child use a finger to trace a letter while saying the letter's sound. Do this on paper, in sand, or on a plate of sugar.
- Have paper and pencils available for your child to use for writing. Working together, write a sentence or two about something special. Encourage her to use the letters and sounds she's learning about in school.
- Practice blending sounds into words. Ask "Can you guess what this word is? m - o - p." Hold each sound longer than normal.
- Go ahead and read your child's favorite book for the 100th time! As you read, pause and ask your child about what is going on in the book.
- Help your child learn the names of the letters and the sounds the letters make. Turn it into a game! "I'm thinking of a letter and it makes the sound mmmmmm."
- Bring along a book or magazine any time your child has to wait, such as at a doctor's office. Always try to fit in reading!
- Encourage your child to re-read favorite books and poems. Re-reading helps kids read more quickly and accurately.
- Ask your child questions about the story you've just read. Say something like, "Why do you think Clifford did that?"
- It's difficult for reading to compete with TV and video games. Encourage reading as a free-time activity.
- When your child is trying to sound out an unfamiliar word, give him or her time to do so. Remind to child to look closely at the first letter or letters of the word.
- Pick books that are at the right level. Help your child pick books that are not too difficult. The aim is to give your child lots of successful reading experiences.
- Play word games! Have your child sound out the word as you change it from mat to fat to sat; from sat to sag to sap; and from sap to sip.
- I read to you, you read to me. Take turns reading aloud at bedtime. Kids enjoy this special time with their parents.
- Gently correct your young reader. When your child makes a mistake, gently point out the letters he or she overlooked or read incorrectly. Many beginning readers will guess wildly at a word based on its first letter.
- Talk, talk, talk! Talk with your child every day about school and things going on around the house. Sprinkle some interesting words into the conversation, and build on words you've talked about in the past.
- Write, write, write! Ask your child to help you write out the grocery list, a thank you note to Grandma, or to keep a journal of special things that happen at home. When writing, encourage your child to use the letter and sound patterns he is learning at school.