How To Make Story Time Special
Every parent understands the importance of reading to their child but exactly when should you start? According to new research more then three quarters of parents begin reading to their child before their first birthday and over a fifth introduce their kids to the world of books before they are 3 months old!
With studies showing kids who are read to at a young age do better in school it comes as no surprise that a massive two thirds of parents read to their child on a daily basis. A further 85% agree that it’s a great bonding activity according to new research by Fairy.
Step 1: Help your child develop
Hello, I'm Wendy Cooling and I'm a reading person. Today what we're going to look at is the importance of very early reading. I will be talking with a mother and child and trying to really look at the best way to do it, and how any parent can help their child into reading. The very early years so important, we all know that that's when most of the child's development takes place. Research has now shown that children who are read to when they're very very young are far more likely to do well in school. So we do know that what happens at home in those early years really matters.
Step 2: Remeber:
The very important things to remember really are these: Don't ever be nervous about reading to your child even if you think you're not a very good reader. The child loves to hear your voice. Your child is really not testing you, you just read what you can and the baby will love it.
Step 3: Read together
When you're sharing a book with a young child look at the cover, read the title and then turn the pages quite slowly. Soon you'll find your child begins to understand exactly how a book works. Encourage him to join in with the noises that the story demands, whether its animal noises or rhyming words at the ends of lines. But you and the child to be doing this together is the important thing.
Step 4: Positive book attitudes
When you're sharing a picture book its a good idea to point sometimes at pictures so that the beginning of the association of words and pictures can begin to take place in your child's mind. And soon you'll find they'll be pointing out the pictures themselves. That is a very good learning experience because we're after visual literacy as well as early literacy. You want your child to feel good about reading so praise as much as possible so that your child develops a really positive attitude towards books.
Step 5: Make story time special.
Another good thing to do in story time is to create your own stories, to tell your own stories so that there are really things that belong to you. For this reason its a really good idea to think about the Make Story time Special Competition and see if you can write a story for Fairy that would possibly win this competition.
Step 6: Vocal techniques
My name is Judy Phillips and my main job is senior voice tutor at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Arts. I suppose I'd say that the thing that I can offer is to talk to people about the potential that their voice has and the importance of the spoken voice. "And you notice when you are talking to me how much range you are using in your voice which is probably much less then you would use if you were talking to Nate. Kids respond really well to those kind of high pitches and different voices. And, again that's what is going to teach his ears as he is listening to you, to use his own voice."
Step 7: Emphasize sounds
I encourage enjoyment and flexibility with the voice, playing with the voice and obviously passing that on to your child because they pick up so much in the way that you talk and your own vocal patterns. "So when we're making sounds like reading and different words, the more we can emphasize the sound of the language, I think it helps them to copy the shape of the mouth."
Step 8: Enjoy what you're doing.
I think there are two things. I think the more you enjoy what you're doing the more your voice is engaged. I think everybody would acknowledge that. Once your voice is engaged you've got more range, you can play, you can imitate people and your child will pick up that flexibility in their own voice, which in turn will give them confidence as they learn to speak themselves.
Step 9: Have fun.
Now we all know how important it is to read to children from the very very beginning. Make story time special for your child. Read as much as you can and have lots of fun. But as well as reading see if you can create your own stories. And you can, if you want to, enter a competition. In order to do this enter The Fairy Makes Story Time Special Competition, check it all out on the website: www.softeningyourworld.com. And if you don't want to do this, if you don't feel that stories are something that you can write, still look out for those special packs of fairy and then you can claim your free Kipper books that your baby will really love.
