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9 Things To Notice When Reading with Kids

9 Things to Notice when Reading with Kids

Following on from 7 Things to Notice on the Cover, here are nine things to notice inside a book when reading with children.

Sometimes;

1. As you read a new book, pause to make observations together or ask questions about what is happening in the story.

2. In picture books, illustrations are as important as words. Notice together interesting details or clues as to what is happening in the story.

3. For older children, ask what they think will happen next or what they would do if they were in a similar situation.

4. At the appropriate moment, pause as an invitation for your child to join you in reading a rhyming word or familiar phrase.

5. Ask your child to point to where the words are on a page (as separate to the illustrations). Talk about the words being the part of the book which you read.

6. Point to the words as you read them. This will show your child where you start reading, that you read English from left to right and that there is one word represented on the page for each word that you say.

7. When re-reading familiar books, point out (or ask your child to point out) any letters which are significant to them, for example, the first letter of their name.

8. For older children, notice punctuation marks, such as full stops, question marks and exclamation marks.

9. Explore the end pages of the book. SquiggleMum posted about the purpose and possibilities of end pages here.

Whilst I would never advocate doing any or all of these things all of the time, these strategies help to develop a child’s awareness of print and auditory and visual memory skills which are important to their future development as independent readers.

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Christie Burnett is an early childhood teacher, presenter, writer and the editor of Childhood 101. More importantly, she is a Mum who believes wholeheartedly in the value of children learning through play, the importance of quality early education, and the togetherness of family.

Read more of Christie's adventures at https://childhood101.com.

Read the comments or scroll down to add your own:

  1. Kit Chase says

    Hello. I am the illustrator for this image, and I just wanted to remind you that my images are protected by copyright and are not to be used without referencing me, Kit Chase, as the owner and illustrator of the images.

    You may use this image for your blog post, however, I do ask that you reference the image.

    Sincerely,

    Kit Chase

  2. Christie - Childhood 101 says

    Thanks, Kit. I always source images at the bottom of the post as you will see. It's a gorgeous image.

  3. Michelle says

    I'm sure it would've been even nicer to ask permission before posting.
    Its very kind of Kit to allow the use of her images without payment!!!
    (As a photographer, I often have copyright issues myself. Love Kits work, have 2 of her illustration hanging in my daughters bedroom, they are just beautiful!)

  6. Kendra says

    Those are great ideas, Christie. I especially like the ideas of taking time out to talk about the illustrations; as an avid reader myself, I tend to get caught up in the words and forget that, especially to my 2-year-old, taking long journeys into the pictures is an important part of the book. And pointing to each word is a great idea too; it's an easy way of reinforcing those early reading ideas.

    Thanks!

  8. Linda Morgen says

    with all respect, I disagree on all points - read and tell stories to children and let them absorb or interpret them in their own individual, creative ways without putting suggestions out there. If they want to know something, let them tell you themselves. Often the story needs it's own unique gestating time for a child to even know how they feel about it. Please stop making reading a lesson for something! By letting children learn the LOVE of reading, all else will follow beautifully and they won't see it as another annoying school assignment. And the best pictures for stories are in the imagination of the reader/listener.

  9. K's Mommy says

    Christie, I loved your post and did many of these things with my daughter before, after and during our reading time together. I even taught her about the author, illustrator and the copyright date (my husband balked at this part). This was done while she was in PreK and she’s now in Kindergarten. We continue to read together and our book discussions have not tainted her love for reading or kept her from sharing her own views on any given story.

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