Top Tips for Teaching Your Child to Read

This is a collaborative post.

Do you want to teach your child to read? The more you read, the cleverer you’ll become. Or so the saying goes. There has been plenty of research conducted to suggest that reading can help to improve academic performance in children.

The reasoning behind this is that as children improve their reading, they can better understand formal communication which supports them at school. It’s also understood that reading improves the brain’s ability to understand new concepts, making it easier for children in their academics.

We have joined a literacy consultancy company to share our top tips for teaching a child to read.

Word Cards

Creating word cards with simple words like ‘cat’, ‘dog’, ‘mat’ and ‘hot’ can help to improve your child’s phonetics. Start by getting your child to pick a card and read the word out loud. Get them to notice what sounds they can hear at the start, in the middle and at the end.

To help, you might find it useful to slow it down so that the sounds become clearer to them. The more this activity is exercised, the easier it will be for your child to identify the words and start reading. Make these cards as colourful as you like with an illustration on the other side to help with memorisation.

Using Songs

You don’t have to be a lyrical genius for this one, there are plenty of songs out there that cater to phonetics. Children love anything that they can sing or clap along to and this will help them to familiarise different sounds.

Storytelling

Another way that you can help your child to read is through regular storytelling. This helps remind children of what words sound like and introduces them to different words. When doing this activity, be sure to read slowly and use your finger as a pointer for each word read out.

Think Outside of The Box

There is no rule to the resources that you can use. You might find that baking with letter-shaped cookie cutters or re-arranging alphabet magnets is more engaging for your child. All children learn in different ways, so feel free to experiment with what works for you.

Speed It Up

When teaching your child to blend sounds, it might not be so obvious for them to grasp what the words are. When saying the sounds out loud, try sounding them faster. This will help your child to spot the words faster and help them with their own reading.