You can make reading fun and yet effective—my tips with the kids 📚📖

Hi moms and dads of hive! I hope you are doing great with your little ones, wherever you are. The new school year has begun; my kids started in the first week of September, and I know that many kids have also resumed this October. The journey of reading could be a new experience and challenging for some of the kids. This is why the @motherhood community deemed it necessary for parents to share their reading tips with their little ones so we can learn from each parent's unique ideas. I will be sharing my tips with you right away.

_{Image editted in canva}

My kids are currently in grades 1 and 3, respectively. We started learning how to read in their preschool class, but then it looked more tedious, unlike now, where they have mastered their vowels and sounds. The journey to learning how to read begins with knowing the alphabetical sounds 🔤. Whenever they are being taught a stage at school, I repeat it at home. Knowing how to sound the alphabets and merging two,three-,four-, and five-letter words and sounding them together was part of how they learned to read, and of course with consistency and constant repetition of those words using rythme. Even now at their grades level, they are still learning how to read and read fluently especially with pages that contains complex words.

Before I show you other reading tips I adopted for my kids at their grade level, which make their reading fun, effective, and lively,let me show you an app we have been exploring and reading fun and exciting stories together with my kids.

_{Kunda kids app, a screenshot image from play store}.

So this is an app you can download and explore fun stories with your kids; it's capable of enhancing their reading skills, just like it is for my kids.

My tips

• Turning reading into a fun activity
• positive reinforcement
• creating a daily routine

Let me explain...

I have noticed that children love fun and exciting activities; some of the kids prefer playing to reading, and my kids aren't exceptions to this. So what I do is turn their reading into some play activities.

How?
Most times, I don't do the normal sitting down and reading with my kids; I try to add life and create fun activities into our reading, and they wouldn't know the difference but are still learning at the same time. This is by forming a singing rythme. I will teach them the rythme, and we sing it together. In the process, I will introduce the learning aspect of the day, and they will dance to my tune because I have gotten their attention, and it becomes a fun activity. The result of this tactic shocked me. Now, they always want me to sing a rhyme, especially turning hard spelling into rhyme and turning lists of words for them to memorise into rhyme, and they sing along. Just last week, they had their midterm test. During their reading periods for the test, we applied this particular rythme style of reading I discussed here, and the speed they used in grabbing the texts was so surprising. What baffles me is that it's even fun for them. Also, there are some readings where images are helpful enough; in that case, we study the image first before reading, and it makes their understanding of the passage so easy.

By creating positive reinforcement, I mean praising your child for one time he did well in reading, for that hard spelling he pronounced well, he or she will definitely feel good about it and would love to do more, feeling happy and valued.

Then finally, create a daily routine. In my home, I created a study schedule with my kids. I create time to be available for them; 30 minutes each day for reading has become our routine, and they have gotten used to it. Now, I am the one running away from their good kind of trouble. lolz, they have fun through reading and want to read with me always and even buy more story books 📚 📖

That's all about my reading tips with my kids, and I recommend that you adopt this style and see how effective it will be for your kids, just like it has been for mine. Also, I have become a reader myself, and as my kids watch me read, they mimic that, and I feel it's a practical example of creating a reading culture in your home.

Thanks for your time on my blog 🤗.

Please note that all images are mine.