Talk your baby into reading
Jennifer M. Prinz, MA, CCC-SLP
MedCentral Pediatric Therapy
Childhood experts lately have been discussing the value of talking and reading to one's baby as much as possible - even before birth. Why? Because research shows that speaking (oral language) and the ability to read and write (literacy) are interrelated skills.
A baby is ready to begin learning language at birth. Babies naturally orient to their parents' voices, and they show a preference for the language their parents speak. Babies begin babbling and learn the specific sounds of their parents' language between the ages of 6 and 8 months. At 12 months, they refine their repertoire of sounds to contain only those of their parents' language and begin to sequence those sounds into meaningful words. This progression demonstrates that a baby is listening to the subtleties of their parents' language and learning those particular rules long before she utters her first word. Therefore, talking to one's baby is not a futile exercise; it provides opportunities for baby to listen, select important meaningful sounds, store them in memory, sequence them into words and learn the underlying rules and vocabulary that construct his language.
preschool children learn to play with sounds (rhyming words and isolating sounds, for example), they gradually learn to separate words into sounds and map sounds onto printed letters. At this stage, children begin to read.
This evolution in learning creates the prerequisite skills for learning to read and write. As babies grow into toddlers, their vocabulary flourishes. They are able to create longer sentences to express their needs and make observations about their world. During this stage, young children begin to learn about the world through language. Preschool age children learn that symbols represent a concrete object, that printed words represent spoken language and that spoken words are comprised of individual sounds (phonological awareness). As
At each stage of development, parents can stimulate language and literacy skills.
Birth - One Year:
- Talk to baby about her environment (toys, people, places, activities).
- Read to baby (books, magazines, newspapers).
- Make books part of baby's daily environment. Encourage her to explore books, look at the pictures and play with them.
- Participate in story time at local libraries or book stores.
12 months - 24 months:
- Talk during shared activities (grocery shopping, playing at the playground). This allows for vocabulary growth and helps your child practice increasingly complex ways to express himself.
- Read stories together. This fosters a positive association between the child's experience and reading.
- Attend story time at local libraries or bookstores.
- Make books available to the child to stimulate knowledge and vocabulary.
- Read favorite stories as many times as the child requests.
2 - 5 Years:
- Talk during shared experiences to promote vocabulary development.
- Read stories to each other and encourage the child to "read" the book in his own words.
- Play rhyming games and sound games to strengthen the child's phonemic awareness skills (for example, "What rhymes with ‘bee?'" "What begins with the ‘b' sound?").
- Draw pictures and write a story about the picture together.
- Make up stories together and tell them to family or friends.
- Point out words in a book as it is being read.
- Play games which involve the child hunting for words in their environment (such as during grocery trips or park outings).
- Play games that involve matching a sound to its symbol (alphabet bingo, for example).
- Make alphabet soup and search for letters or sounds.
- Break words into individual sounds (i.e. how many sounds are in the word "bat"?).
- Participate in joint literacy experiences at the library or area bookstores.
- Encourage book reading in a child's daily routine. Make age-appropriate books available.
The ways to nurture language and literacy are endless. Children are first born with the capacity to learn the sounds and structure of their parents' language. Babies want to hear their caretakers talking to them. From there, babies acquire oral language skills necessary for reading and writing. Talking and reading to an infant and preschooler are not pointless acts. Research continues to show the relationship between listening comprehension and reading comprehension. Children need to develop the skills of listening and talking in order to read and write. By taking the time to talk and read to baby, a parent is assisting in establishing the foundational skills necessary for that child's future academic success.