Another interesting topic that the IRA NAEYC position paper covered was the concept of reading aloud to children. The paper says that it is the most important activity for building understanding and skills essential for reading success. If a child feels emotionally secure and confident in his or her reading ability, they will develop more of an excitement for reading and will move on to more advanced material. Creating a love and interest in reading is in my opinion the most important task a teacher possesses and is the most important task in a child's reading development.
In my Children's Literature class, our teacher has time and time again stressed the importance of reading to your children. She says that it should be done at least once a day and should cover a wide abundance of topics. She told us of a single father who read to his daughter every night for 3,218 days and even up until she left for college. The girl, Alice Ozma, has stated that this changed her life in so many ways, including her relationship with her father. The two of them have dedicated their lives to spreading the word of how important and beneficial it is to read to your children. Below is a link to their site.
http://www.makeareadingpromise.com/
That is incredible that he read that much to her but it is so awesome that he did. In my children's lit class our teacher told us that kids should have heard close to one thousand books before they enter school. Of course, that is a bit extreme but it just gives us an example of how important reading to our kids really is.
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed the story of Alice and her father. It kind of makes me sad for those who don't have involved and dedicated parents. I guess that is when reading aloud as a teacher becomes so imperative.
ReplyDeleteI have also heard that it's important to read aloud, no matter the age! I remember learning about this and initially thinking it was silly, but it seems to really benefit kids of all ages. This story is super inspirational and shows too how reading aloud can help improve parent-child and teacher-child relationships!
ReplyDeleteJosh, what an interesting website. I have never seen that. Thanks for sharing. These are the kind of things I love people sharing in their blog posts!
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