Reading Aloud...Why Do it?
"Reading to children before they can read themselves is as important as inoculating them against measles and polio. Reading aloud inoculates children, as it were, against the crippling condition of illiteracy. It helps them to learn to read more easily, more happily, and more quickly than children who haven't been read to. Reading aloud is one of the most important tools parents and educators can use to create a sound foundation for lifelong learning skills." This is how the author, Mem Fox, recently wrote about reading aloud in the magazine Creative Classroom May/June 2002.
Agreeing with Mem Fox is easy. Finding the time to read aloud as well as continuing to read aloud to children who can already read are two important problems for parents.
Please keep reading the hints below, and establish reading aloud as a sacred activity in your family.
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Turn off the TV! |
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Experts suggest that you read the book to yourself before you read it to your child. That takes so much time. I say, get good at choosing good books and just do it! |
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For younger listeners, choose books that have important elements of rhyme, rhythm, or repetition. |
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Talk about the story, the pictures, the words, the values, the ideas. |
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Try reading aloud 3 stories a day to young children--an old favorite, a familiar story, and one that's new. |
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With older children and longer books, try to leave off at suspenseful parts so they will be eager to come back to it. |
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Have a read-aloud ritual--same time, same place, same cushions, etc. (It doesn't always have to be at bedtime. My sons and I always read after one of them received his allergy shots. Soon, almost everyone in the clinic was listening.) |
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Don't worry if you don't have a ritual, just start doing it any time. Rituals create themselves. |
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Bring books wherever you go, maybe you'll have a long wait, or a short wait. You could be reading! |
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If you have a collection of poetry or nursery rhymes, have your children choose the ones or the pages to read. No one could stand to hear Mother Goose from beginning to end. |
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If your child wants the same book over and over and over, just go with it as much as you can stand it. They are memorizing it, and this is one of the steps toward reading! Also, they are really saying, "You do it so well." |
Consider
some of these titles:
Grades K-3
All Dr. Seuss books
Read-AloudRhymes for the Very Young and other books of poetry by Jack Prelutsky
Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak
The Magic Hat, Is your Mama a Llama?: and other books by Mem Fox
Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day and other books by Judith Viorst
Frog and Toad are Friends and other books by Arnold Lobel
Lauth-eteria and other books of poetry by Douglas Florian
A Light in the Attic, Where the Sidewalk Ends, Falling Up, and other books by Shel Silverstein
Grades 3-6 
Freckel Juice and other books by Judy Blume
Dear Mr. Henshaw and other books by Beverly Cleary
The Cody series like Cody Unplugged or Virtual Cody, by Betsey Duffey
Maniac Magee, Crash, or other books by Jerry Spinelli
Number the Stars by Lois Lowry
Island of the Blue Dolphins by Scott O'Dell
The Time Warp Trio series by Jon Scieszka
Remember, if you like the books, you will enjoy reading aloud more, and so will your children. Enjoy! And let the webmaster know of your favorite read alouds so we can add them to our lists.
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