International Literacy Day is celebrated on September 8th and was started as a way for the world to recognize the importance of literacy. Being literate is so much more than the ability to read and write, it’s encompassed of the small skills that grow to make larger skills possible: the ability to make up rhymes, hearing the sounds letters make, and generally wanting to engage with language. It’s easy to fall under the belief that school is where literacy starts. Although teachers do a fantastic job of developing literacy and helping young minds expand, the path to being literate starts before kiddos are school age.
What’s the easiest, most economical, and impactful route to helping your child be literate? Reading to them. I’m sure you’ve heard this touted from the rooftops since your child arrived in this world. In fact, it almost seems too good to be true, doesn’t it? How can curling up in a cozy chair and reading Goodnight Moon or discovering what The Very Hungry Caterpillar ate really affect their literacy development that much?
In The Read-Aloud Handbook, writer, speaker, and father Jim Trelease goes into detail on this subject. In short, he explains that what a child listens to becomes the basis of how their brain is formed. Not only are we, as parents, creating a nurturing bond with our children while reading, but we are also helping to form their vocabulary, providing a reading role model, helping them associate reading with pleasure, creating background knowledge, and planting a desire in them to read.
Pretty powerful stuff, right?
Here are some ideas, this International Literacy Day, on how to create a culture of literacy in your house. With a little creativity, all of these ideas can be done rather inexpensively.
Develop a Home Library
A home library is just that, a place in your house where your child can always find books. There is such benefit to always having books readily on hand and shows your child that you value literacy. Thrift stores, scholastic book fairs, and the Dolly Parton Imagination Library are all fantastic resources for adding books to your collection for a good price.
Read that favorite again and again and again…
There are a few books that I can literally recite by memory, I’m looking at you The Big Red Barn and The Circus Ship. You know what though? Not only can I recite these, so can my kids. Think about all the thinking that takes! These favorites of my kids have also hold a close place in my heart rereading them brings me back to the smallness of them curled up beside me. Sometimes the thought of reading that book again makes us want to hide, but powering through it has so many benefits.
Tell Stories
We are bombarded with bells and whistles these days, fancy apps that offer animated stories or silly sound effects. It’s easy to fall under the spell of these and let technology do the hard work of coming up with a story for us. But I’ll let you in on a little secret: every single time I’ve told a made-up story either to my students or my own children they’ve been captivated. They don’t need pictures, much less animation, to make stories come alive. They just need imagination. There’s plenty of resources out there about oral storytelling. This story is a good one to start with if you’re a little unsure about making up your own. But next time you’re sitting in a doctor’s office with absolutely nothing to do, try coming up with your own. There’s a good chance your kids will be into it!
Audiobooks
There are some who believe listening to an audiobook isn’t truly reading; however, I beg to differ. As a child listens, they are exposed to a ton of new vocabulary, have the chance to use their imagination, and can be exposed to books that might be above their reading level but perfect for them to listen to. My family has the best luck playing audiobooks while in the van during errands or when we go on a longer trip. I like to borrow physical c.d.’s from our library (I might have a storage issue on my phone) but other people swear by their library’s Overdrive or paid resources such as Audible and Scribd. Our recent favorites have been Spin, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, and The Mouse and the Motorcycle.
Podcasts for kids
We discovered podcasts for kids several years ago and thoroughly enjoy listening to them while we use playdough, color, or eat a snack. Podcasts are typically shorter than an audiobook and can be digested in a smaller amount of time. We like to use our Echo Dot to listen to our favorites: Stories Podcast and Circle Round Podcast.
So on International Literacy Day, remember this quote from Emilie Buchwald: “Children are made readers on the laps of their parents.”
