All The Benefits of Reading Out Loud With Your Children
Reading out loud is a big step for your children. It’s an exercise that helps them develop reading fluency. It’s also a wonderful way to provide them with countless academic benefits.
You must keep in mind that children understand language much better by listening rather than reading. That’s why reading out loud makes complex ideas more accessible.
Reading out loud nurtures children and creates positive associations with books and reading. It also increases their motivation, curiosity and memory.
Support and motivation
For children who have difficulties learning to read, it’s very useful for them to listen to good readers reading out loud. This will allow them to develop fluency skills and, consequently, improve their reading ability.
Sometimes, children freeze up when faced with a text they have to read for themselves. In these cases, you must have patience and support the little one.
Your support and motivation will allow children to overcome these problems. Motivation is key for kids when it comes to reading, as this will greatly fuel their passion.
Benefits of reading out loud
Reading out loud has countless benefits for children:
- Helps strengthen the maternal bond.
- Promotes pronunciation and allows children to enrich their vocabulary.
- Helps to memorize and learn better.
- Contributes to linguistic knowledge.
- Exercises imagination and creativity.
- Develops attention and concentration.
- Helps them overcome fears and builds self-confidence.
Tips to help your child read out loud
If you need advice on how to help your child read out loud, then you’ve come to the right place!
1. Echo reading
This first piece of advice is ideal for helping children with a passage that causes them problems. To make it possible, you should be the one who reads first, with your little one following the words carefully with his finger.
When you’ve finished reading the text, it will be time to switch roles and let him try. While he’s reading, your job will be limited to listening and keeping him company so that he feels comfortable. This type of method is called echo reading.
This type of reading will help the child read more fluently, as he’ll be imitating you. He’ll see where you take the breaks and place your intonations. It will also help him gain speed and precision.
2. Reading in unison
Reading in unison consists of mother and child simultaneously reading a text or a part of it. It’s great fun for both. As a mother, you must adapt your reading rhythm to your child’s.
At this stage, the child will still have many difficulties reading, and so you should encourage him and make him feel comfortable.
This second method offers similar benefits to echo reading. This means that he’ll have access to someone to imitate, someone who will support him as he reads. It will also help him improve his reading speed, accuracy and expression.
“Some children have difficulty reading and freeze up when faced with a text to read on their own. In those cases, you must have patience and support “
3. Reading companions
In this third activity, the child has to read a text while the mother follows, listens and provides comments as necessary. This approach will allow your child to read more fluently, especially because of the level of support and feedback.
As and when he receives your comments on his reading, he can correct his errors. This reading method encourages greater accuracy and is very motivating for the little one.
4. Creative reading
This last suggestion can be very useful to motivate your child to read out loud. This time it’s about reading with your child in a creative way. You must adapt the voice or messages according to the situations that occur in the book.
For example, you can try to put on a different voice when different characters speak, or even try to mimic the accent of a foreign character.
When the story involves sound effects, you should make the most of it. Animal sounds will work perfectly and will engage children in the reading activities.
Finally, we have to emphasize that helping your child read out loud will provide long-term benefits, such as better imagination or being passionate about reading. It also has immediate benefits, including enjoying quality time with your little one.
All cited sources were thoroughly reviewed by our team to ensure their quality, reliability, currency, and validity. The bibliography of this article was considered reliable and of academic or scientific accuracy.
- Cova, Y. (2004). La práctica de la lectura en voz alta en el hogar y en la escuela a favor de niños y niñas. Sapiens. Revista Universitaria de Investigación, 5(2), 53-66. https://www.redalyc.org/pdf/410/41050205.pdf
- Viquez, Z. U., López-Tejeda, S. I., Rivas, M. C. V., Mendoza-Barrera, G., & Durand-RiveraII, A. (2013). Leer: Un proceso complejo del neurodesarrollo. Rev Mex AMCAOF, 2(2), 89-92.