• General Tips for Parents:

    • Read to and with your children every day. Discuss the characters, events and what you like best about the book.
    • Demonstrate how much you value reading by keeping books, magazines and other reading materials in the house. Take trips to the library.
    • Keep pencils, paper, crayons, and washable markers handy for notes, lists, and schoolwork. Writing takes practice, and it starts and is reinforced at home.
    • Teach your children to do things for themselves. It takes practice to learn to do things correctly.
    • Limit the time children spend watching television. Studies indicate that achievement drops for children who watch more than 10 hours of television a week.
    • Establish a regular time for homework each afternoon or evening. Set aside a quiet, well-lit place, and encourage children to study.
    • Review your children's homework with them. Point out errors, but let them correct their own work.
    • Have a dictionary available (age-appropriate), and let your children look up words they aren't able to spell.
    • Talk to your children, and listen to them as well. Find out about their day, friends, and the things that are really important to them.
    • Encourage your children. Praise them for the things they do well.
    • Have your children attend school regularly.
    • Keep in touch with the school. Attend parent conferences and meetings.

    Tips for Inspiring Great Readers:

    When parents help their children learn to read, they open the door to a big, exciting world, and provide them with the necessary tools to become successful students and lifelong learners. Here are reading activities you can do with your children:

    • Read aloud to your child.
    • Read poems aloud together to learn the rhythm and repeated sounds in language.
    • Point to the words on the page when you read to your children.
    • Listen to your children read every day.
    • Have books, magazines, and newspapers around the house, and let your child see you read, too.
    • Pick a story or poem that repeats phrases; assign each child a phrase to repeat each time you read a new part of the story.
    • Take turns reading. You read a paragraph and your child can read the next one. This activity helps to keep the story alive.
    • Be flexible enough to not quickly abandon a book that does not appeal after a reasonable try at reading it. No one is meant to enjoy every book.
    • Go to the library to check out books often. Have each family member use his or her own library card.
    • Provide your child with a dictionary and a thesaurus.
    • Encourage your child to make a special dictionary by putting together several sheets of paper for a booklet. Have your child write a recently learned word at the top of the page, the meaning of the word and a sentence using the word on the same page. Cutting pictures from magazines or with their own drawings can illustrate words.
    • Encourage your child to keep a journal. Include thoughts on books that have been read.
    • Cook with your child and read the recipe together.
    • Label the things in your child's room.

    **Encourage your child to use the following reading strategies:**

    Think about words, and when you come to a word you don't know:
    • Look for the largest chunks you know (syllables, prefixes, suffixes). Try to say the word.
    • Look at the letters and think about the sounds. Try to sound out the word.
    • Re-read the sentence. Does it make sense?
    Strategies for Success!

    Clarify - Re-read or discuss words or points that were not clear.
    Predict - What will happen or what will we learn?
    Question - After reading, ask a question for others to answer.