Read Aloud

One of the most important activities parents and teachers can do with preschool and kindergarten students, is reading aloud to them. This also holds true for older students. Apart from the obvious benefits of building literacy skills [reading, writing, speaking, listening], fostering a love of the written word and a huge sense of fun, reading aloud to children also help them internalize language and structures that will eventually inform how they themselves will read and write. Listening to a story read aloud frees one from decoding the written word, and allows one to build a visual narrative in the mind. Students at various reading abilities get to participate together in the unfolding story and reading becomes a joyous community adventure. Teachers can model reading practices as they read aloud – predicting what the book might be about from the title and cover illustration, stopping at various points to discuss what just took place and what it might mean, predicting what might happen next and adding new information to previous information to further understand character motivations and plot points. Teachers or parents can pick books that might be a little too complex for the child to read on their own, but can still be within grasp when read aloud. This can build confidence in one’s ability to read and comprehend new text.

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