What if I were to start this blog post with the phrase, “In a great green room…,” ask you what the brown bear sees, or simply inquire as to what very hungry caterpillars eat? I’m willing to bet that most of you, as parents (not to mention grandparents, child care providers and early educators), would be able to finish the sentence and answer the questions without pause.
I imagine that for many of you, these ever-so-simple references would likely also conjure up the colorful images and happy memories that tend to go hand in hand with reading such beloved children’s books as Margaret Wise Brown’s, “Goodnight Moon;” or “Brown Bear, Brown Bear” written by Bill Martin, Jr. and illustrated by Eric Carle; and “The Very Hungry Caterpillar,” written and illustrated by Carle. Yet all too often, I find that discussions about early literacy move away from what we all know and love about the experience of reading aloud with young children, and towards the more literal, academic advantages. That includes getting kids familiar with “sight words” — or commonly used words kids are encouraged to memorize, or know on sight; teaching them the sounds of letters; and all of the various other nuts and bolts of learning to read.
[Read: Bring Books to Life for Young Kids and Babies.]
That’s not to say efforts focused on promoting early literacy and helping young children make the necessary connections between sounds, letters and words are without benefit. After all, learning to read affords children the ability to spend the rest of their lives reading to learn. There is no question that reading aloud with young children can facilitate their learning their ABCs and help set them up for reading and life success.
There are, however, many more benefits to reading aloud with young children that I find are all too often undervalued or missed altogether. These include fostering foundationally important social and emotional skills as well as key aspects of executive functioning. While these concepts may seem equally academic and abstract, in reality they represent important basic aspects of early brain and child development. Mounting evidence tells us that a focus on developing these other skills stands to have a potentially lifelong positive impact on our children.
So without further ado, here are some of the other advantages of reading aloud to babies and toddlers to keep in mind as you enjoy turning the pages together:
Sharing shows caring. Unless you have multitasking abilities that far exceed mine, you’ve probably discovered that it’s impossible to read aloud and at the same time check your email, scroll through social media posts or talk on the phone, which means that reading aloud stands to give your child the invaluable gift of your undivided attention.
From Harvard University’s Center on the Developing Child, we now know that shared attention and the back-and-forth, caring interactions between responsive adults and young children are invaluable not only for their healthy development, but for connecting neurons in developing brains. So remember, first and foremost, to make your time spent reading aloud a fun, engaging and regularly shared experience.
[Read: Teaching Children to Be More in Tune With Their Minds.]
Put words to emotions. Books offer an effortless yet invaluable opportunity for expanding not just a child’s overall vocabulary but, in particular, their emotional vocabulary. That’s because while everyday conversations with toddlers typically revolve around basic emotions like happy, sad and mad, even books written for very young children often introduce a much wider range of emotions; and they also provide the context and expanded vocabulary necessary for children to learn and describe these emotions to better express themselves.
Teach your kids to read people. The ability to read other people is at the core of emotional intelligence, empathy and what I call ” we skills,” which allow us to understand, share and “play well” with others. Conveniently enough, we can teach children to better read people by reading to them, taking the time to point out and discuss expressions on characters’ faces, and helping them learn to recognize the feelings of others.
Help them pay attention longer. Attention span is not something that can be taught using flashcards. But regularly reading aloud provides children a fun and engaging way to practice paying attention and increase their attention span. This is particularly good news given that focus and attention are critical for learning.
When my three children were very young, we spent a lot of time reading books together. Naturally, their attention spans were relatively short at first — on the order of 10 to 15 minutes at best. But with time, patience and daily practice (along with the recognition that letting them color or build a puzzle while they were listening greatly increased how long they were able to sit and listen), their attention span grew. By the time they entered kindergarten, they could happily pay attention and listen to stories for hours.
[See: 10 Concerns Parents Have About Their Kids’ Health.]
Foster imagination and expand their horizons. Novel brain research using neuroimaging technology called functional MRI reveals that reading aloud to children results in higher activation of the brain in areas associated with mental imagery and imagination. Given that creativity is globally prized, this sort of finding serves to reinforce what has long been believed — that reading aloud is a great way to expand young children’s horizons and introduce them to a broader world of ideas, people and places.
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5 More Reasons You Should Read Aloud to Your Kids originally appeared on usnews.com
