“ Make sure you’re reading with them at home.” “Read to your child everyday” “ Books , books and lots of books” I am sure that you hear this time and time again. You’re being told all the time and from all angles (even from me), that you need to be reading to your child and you need to be doing it often, but many times no one is telling you why and explaining the benefits. Beyond wanting your child to develop a love of reading , there are other amazing benefits that your child will gain from you reading to , or with them on a daily basis.
Stimulate Their Imagination
Books give us access to a whole new world. It has the capacity to expand your child’s imagination and give them a new lense to explore different people, places, and events beyond their own experiences. Imagination helps to develop important skills in early childhood. It benefits their social, emotional, physical, and language development. When their Imagination is stimulated it helps improve problem-solving skills and helps them think more creatively. All of these skills in turn can benefit their school, work, and life experiences in the future.
Support Their Cognitive Development
Cognitive development is the construction of thought processes, including remembering, problem solving, and decision-making, from childhood through adolescence to adulthood. Between the ages of 3 to 5, your child’s thinking skills are developing rapidly. They also begin to use logic to think about how and why things work in the world around them. Their ability to use representational thought and symbols to stand for objects, people and events,start to become more complex. Reading books promote reasoning and problem solving, memory and social cognition which all in turn strengthen your child’s cognitive development.
Exposure To New Vocabulary
According to a recent study , young children whose parents or caregivers read them 5 books a day enter kindergarten having heard 1.4 million more words than kids who are not read to at home. Even those who were read to on average 2-3 books a day are exposed to 290,000 more words than those children who are not being read to. The exposure to new vocabulary helps strengthen both their receptive and expressive language skills , allowing them to become better at communicating.
Improves Concentration And Attention Span
If you have a young child under the age of five , you know how hard it can be to get them to remain still and focused on one thing for more than a few minutes at a time. While it is completely developmentally appropriate for them to not be able to sit still for too long, spending time reading can make the time they take to relax and focus a little bit longer. Reading regularly with your child , especially by using books that interest them will allow them to start being able to remain focused and concentrate for longer periods. The improvement of their attention span and concentration will certainly make a huge difference in their academic careers.
While it can seem like another daunting task on an already long daily to-do list, the benefits that your child will gain from reading with them daily is certainly worth the trouble.
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