Wordy 30

We are looking for glue (or: Why reading aloud matters)

Recently I came across this blog post that clearly mirrors my own thoughts on what it meant to read aloud with my own children.  You start doing so because you hear it is good for them.  I suffered through the repetitive picture books and hung in there until something unforeseen took place. 

In this day with so much vying for your children's focus, there remains this one very simple thing you can do to build relationship. 

Do you want your children to know how you think about the world around you?  Read aloud with them.

Do you want to go to more incredible places than you could ever afford to take them?  Read to them.

Discover the value of having mutual friends.  Read to them.

Do you want to increase their vocabulary in an effortless fashion?  Read to them.

Do you want them to learn to love learning?  Read to them.

Are you interested in an easy way to connect with your child at the end of a day when you are exhausted?  Read to them.

You will enjoy it too.
 

Vocabulary!

For some time, I have heard our upper level teachers concerned about the limited vocabulary their students possess.  These are bright students.  They just lack sufficient vocabulary to do the kind of work of which they are otherwise capable.  They have a "word" handicap.

There are workbooks. There is curriculum.  There is the "old as dirt" method of looking up a definition and then writing a sentence using the word.  There also exists the practice of reading aloud to children, a painless, even enjoyable method of increasing vocabulary. 

Here are some ideas from page 17 of the 7th Edition of Jim Trelease's book, The Read-Aloud Handbook: 

Where is the better vocabulary:  Conversation or reading?  Most conversation is plain and simple, whether it's between two adults or with children.  It consists of the five thousand words we use all the time, called the Basic Lexicon.  (Indeed, 83 percent of the words in normal conversation with a child come from the most commonly used thousand words, and it doesn't change much as the child ages.)  Then there are another five thousand words we use in conversation less often.  Together, these ten thousand words are called the Common Lexicon.  Beyond that ten thousand mark are the "rare words," and these play a critical role in reading as we grow older.  The eventual strength of our vocabulary is determined not by the ten thousand common words but by how many rare words we understand.

If we don't use these rare words very often in conversation, where do we find them?

Multiple copies of Jim Trelease's book are available on both campuses for parent and teacher checkout.

Here is a sampling of the research that supports the importance of reading aloud and vocabulary apprehension:

 

Why we should all be reading aloud to children

 Who doesn't enjoy a good Ted Talk? 

This one by Rebecca Bellingham, in just 9:29 seconds will inspire you to give your kids access to books by reading aloud.  Because when you do the hard work of decoding and presentation, you free them to think!

Do you need more moments of connectedness with your children?  Read aloud to them.