Growing
Up to Read
Birth
Through Age Four:
Children begin to
develop their language skills in infancy. Even their babbles and coos and the
ways their families speak to them before they really understand can help them
to become speakers of their native tongue. When an infant shows excitement over
pictures in a storybook, when a two-year-old scribbles with a crayon, when a
four-year-old points out letters in a street sign—all these actions signal a
child’s growing literacy development.
The more children already know about the nature and purposes of
reading before kindergarten, the more teachers must build on in their reading
instruction. Research reveals that the children most at risk for reading
difficulties in the primary grades are those who began school with less verbal
skill, less phonological awareness, less letter knowledge, and less familiarity
with the basic purposes and mechanisms of reading.
To prepare children for reading instruction in the early
grades, it is best that they be exposed to high-quality language and literacy
environments—in their homes, day care centers, and preschools. The best time to
start sharing books with children is during babyhood, even when they are as
young as six weeks.
Here are some concrete, activities, and ideas for how
families, early childhood educators, health care professionals, and communities
can bring literacy into the lives of young children:
Everyday
Literacy: One Family Home
Promoting literacy at home does not mean creating an academic
setting and formally teaching children. Parents and other caregivers can take
advantage of opportunities that arise in daily life to help their children
develop language and literacy. Often, these are unplanned, casual acts, like
commenting on words on an article of clothing or engaging children in conversation.
At other times, it is a conscious effort to read good books with children or
provide toys that promote good literacy development.
Extended
Vocabulary and Language Development
Children who are exposed to sophisticated vocabulary in the
course of interesting conversations learn the words they will later need to
recognize and understand when reading. Vocalization in the crib gives way to
play with rhyming language and nonsense words. Toddlers find that the words
they use in conversation and the objects they represent are depicted in
books—that the picture is a symbol for the real object and that the writing
represents spoken language. In addition to listening to stories, children label
the objects in books, comment on the characters, and request that an adult read
to them. In their third and fourth years, children use new vocabulary and
grammatical constructions in their own speech. Talking to adults is children’s
best source of exposure to new vocabulary and ideas.
Enjoy,
Ms. Nora Sierra
Early Childhood Assistant Principal
Discovery School
