Some of my most cherished memories from childhood were when I was read to by my family, and especially my older sister. My all time favorite story as a child...The Velveteen Rabbit. Not long after our eldest son was born, my big sister sent me a copy of the Velveteen Rabbit so that I could read it to my children. Opening the package and seeing the cover filled me with a joy known widely to children, and dimly to adults.
I have so many beautiful memories of reading with my boys. Our nightly ritual, after bath and brushing teeth, included snuggling together and reading a good book, or me listening intently as my wife read love into every word. At first, we read board books with brilliant pictures: Sandra Boynton and Eric Carle and the like. We then graduated to Winnie the Pooh and Doctor Seuss and Shel Silverstein. Eventually, we were reading the Chronicles of Narnia and Harry Potter and A Series of Unfortunate Events and so much more. By the time the boys were older, they were voracious readers. My younger son especially loved to read, and in one year read over a hundred books along the lines of Artemis Fowl.
It is no accident that our children love to read. My wife and I are both readers. We also made it our priority to read with our children. We had books in our cars. We took books wherever and however we traveled. We read in the waiting rooms of our dentist and pediatrician. Birthdays and holidays always involved books. We stood in line late at night for the newest Harry Potter. It is also no coincidence that our children read years above grade level, love big ideas, and have wonderful vocabularies and imaginations.
For years, educators and pediatricians have harped on parents about the importance of reading to and with their children. We know with absolute certainty that children develop the lion's share of their learning capacity in the first years of their lives. Due to their sensitivity to language during early childhood, children who are read to with regularity, have much more developed literacy skills later in life. A recent study by the Melbourne Institute of Applied Economics and Social Research (2013) quantifies this profound truth--reading to young children six to seven days per week puts them nearly a year ahead of peers who do not experience being read to regularly, and that's only within early childhood. This disparity grows even wider as children grow older.
Of greater interest are the results of a 2013 study by the University of London Institute of Education, which measured the impact of reading on 6000 students over many years. This study found that children who read for pleasure are likely to do significantly better in school, particularly in terms of their acquisition of vocabulary, their ability to spell, their ability to write, and their performance in mathematics.
As parents, you are your children's first and most important teachers, intentionally and unintentionally. There are so many benefits that result from reading regularly to your children: they learn to read sooner, they learn to read with greater fluency, they have more developed vocabularies, they are more sensitive to other languages, they are often earlier to write and, over time, far better writers. Through reading you cultivate in your children habits of mind that will serve them for a lifetime. They will be bigger thinkers, and people more open to new ideas and other people. Of course, reading with your children regularly grows your relationship with them...they never have to guess how important they are in your busy adult lives.
See you around campus.
I have so many beautiful memories of reading with my boys. Our nightly ritual, after bath and brushing teeth, included snuggling together and reading a good book, or me listening intently as my wife read love into every word. At first, we read board books with brilliant pictures: Sandra Boynton and Eric Carle and the like. We then graduated to Winnie the Pooh and Doctor Seuss and Shel Silverstein. Eventually, we were reading the Chronicles of Narnia and Harry Potter and A Series of Unfortunate Events and so much more. By the time the boys were older, they were voracious readers. My younger son especially loved to read, and in one year read over a hundred books along the lines of Artemis Fowl.
It is no accident that our children love to read. My wife and I are both readers. We also made it our priority to read with our children. We had books in our cars. We took books wherever and however we traveled. We read in the waiting rooms of our dentist and pediatrician. Birthdays and holidays always involved books. We stood in line late at night for the newest Harry Potter. It is also no coincidence that our children read years above grade level, love big ideas, and have wonderful vocabularies and imaginations.
For years, educators and pediatricians have harped on parents about the importance of reading to and with their children. We know with absolute certainty that children develop the lion's share of their learning capacity in the first years of their lives. Due to their sensitivity to language during early childhood, children who are read to with regularity, have much more developed literacy skills later in life. A recent study by the Melbourne Institute of Applied Economics and Social Research (2013) quantifies this profound truth--reading to young children six to seven days per week puts them nearly a year ahead of peers who do not experience being read to regularly, and that's only within early childhood. This disparity grows even wider as children grow older.
Of greater interest are the results of a 2013 study by the University of London Institute of Education, which measured the impact of reading on 6000 students over many years. This study found that children who read for pleasure are likely to do significantly better in school, particularly in terms of their acquisition of vocabulary, their ability to spell, their ability to write, and their performance in mathematics.
As parents, you are your children's first and most important teachers, intentionally and unintentionally. There are so many benefits that result from reading regularly to your children: they learn to read sooner, they learn to read with greater fluency, they have more developed vocabularies, they are more sensitive to other languages, they are often earlier to write and, over time, far better writers. Through reading you cultivate in your children habits of mind that will serve them for a lifetime. They will be bigger thinkers, and people more open to new ideas and other people. Of course, reading with your children regularly grows your relationship with them...they never have to guess how important they are in your busy adult lives.
See you around campus.