What was the last book you read? Why did you enjoy reading it? Why am I asking so many questions? Well, reading has never been more important to us and our children. At Monteagle, we will be focusing on motivating your children to read more than ever this year and we need your help to do this!
So what are the benefits of your child reading for pleasure? A great deal of research has been carried out over the last few decades. Many of the benefits that exploring books and building a reading habit with your child can bring include:
– improved relationships
– insight into the world view of others
– reading achievement
– success in other subjects such as maths
You can support your child reading at home and can find out more about how to do so here:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/articles/zbxby9q
https://www.booktrust.org.uk/books-and-reading/tips-and-advice/reading-with-your-child-4-6-years/#!?q=&sortOption=AtoZ&pageNo=2
As a parent of two myself, I was also blown away upon reading the following findings:
Researchers in the United States who had looked at the impact of parents reading with their children quoted the following figures in a news release about their findings:
Here’s how many words kids would have heard by the time they were 5 years old:
Never read to, 4,662 words; 1–2 times per week, 63,570 words; 3–5 times per week, 169,520 words; daily, 296,660 words; and five books a day, 1,483,300 words.
Needless to say, I read to my children after reading this!
I then went on to find out some other reasons as to why reading aloud to my children is so important (no matter how old they are) and found the following video really useful:
With all this research available to us, it seemed necessary to do something at Monteagle to motivate our children to have a love of reading and be motivated to read more. In order to achieve this, we have introduced a ‘Monteagle Reading Card’ through our ‘Reading is Power’ initiative. Please take some time to read through the attached power point below which will explain how it works. The children and teachers are excited to get started with this and your children may already be talking to you about it! Please DO talk to us about how your child is getting on with their reading at home, whether that’s sharing books with you or reading independently, we want to know!
We would love any feedback and suggestions you have also so please do come and speak to us.
Your English leaders,
Mrs Gregoire and Miss Jenkin
