Supporting your Child's Early Literacy
12 August 2024
There are many ways that whānau can positively impact their child’s early literacy development by creating opportunities during day to day interactions. Here are just three of the ways you can help support your child on their literacy learning journey.
Listening and speech-sound awareness (phonological awareness)
Being down at your child’s level and speaking face to face helps your child to see the shape of your mouth while you are talking which will help make it easier for them to imitate you and create their own speech sounds.
Talking nice and slow will also help your child to pick up all the different sounds that go into creating words and sentences.
Pointing out noises you can hear in the background of everyday situations is a fantastic way to support phonological awareness.
Playing games such as eye-spy helps children to pick up what the initial sound in words are.
Reading to your child
Children learn so much from being read to long before they learn to read, in fact, studies have shown that even reading to a baby in utero can help stimulate brain activity that helps support early literacy and language development!
Just imagine that if you read a book a day to your child from the day they are born that is 1825 books they have the potential to be exposed to before they’ve even turned five!
Reading helps children learn the sounds of letters in spoken language as well as helping them learn lots of different things all about their world.
Not only do books provide children with new vocabulary but they can also introduce thoughts and ideas that may extend beyond what they may otherwise encounter on a day to day basis.
Reading rhyming books with lots of repetition is a great way to help your child recognise the different sounds in words and that they are made up of smaller speech sounds. Sliding your fingers under the words as you read them creates a link between how the word sounds and how it is written.
Reading to your child doesn’t have to be confined to just books however- pointing out different signs, items in the grocery store and other objects with the written alphabet on them helps children to become familiar with the look of letters and the phonological sound that they make.
Singing to your child
Singing is a fun way to immerse your child in early literacy!
It helps children develop listening skills as they listen to the rythyms and rhymes of what they are being sung.
Singing (and also clapping to the beat) is a great way for children to hear different syllables – often syllables are sung in different notes.
Singing also helps children with memory recall as it activates a different part of the brain than what spoken language uses! Ever wonder why you can remember all the words to a song from your childhood but can’t remember where you put your keys?!
Children love the repetition that songs and music can bring (just ask early learning teachers how often they are asked to play baby shark!)
It is never too late (or early) to start supporting your child with their early literacy learning, not only is it fantastic bonding time together but it can also help set your child up as a lifelong learner.
For more ideas on supporting your child’s learning click here
For a printable PDF version of this article click here
Click here to learn more about the many learning benefits of blowing bubbles
Click here to learn more about the ways playdough can support your child's learning
Click here for ways that you can support your child's maths learning
Music and Movement
Is there anything more fantastic than seeing an infant, toddler or young child fully rocking to a beat with their own artistic movements, not a care in the world as they create, move and groove to music that sometimes only they can hear?! There are, of course many learning benefits for children when they engage in music and movement, these are just a few of them as well as some ways that you can bring music and movement to life for your child.
Read more
Family and Dramatic Play
Young children are learning their place in the world every single day in multiple ways. The ideas that they form from observing the world around them will often show up when children are engaging in family and dramatic play, but what exactly is family and dramatic play and what are the benefits of your child engaging in it?
Read more
A month full of Cultural Celebrations and Learning!
Kia Ora! This month has been full of exciting activities and cultural celebrations at our preschool! We celebrated Cook Islands Week and Tongan Language Week by learning about greetings, colors, numbers, and the days of the week from these cultures. The children enjoyed making Tongan “Otai” and learning some Cook Islands language from one of our dads. We also had a visit from the librarian who entertained the children with puppet stories and songs. A highlight was our parent evening where we discussed raising resilient children. Parents learned about language development and strategies for managing common behavior issues. The children had fun with our homemade Olympic Games, where they created and awarded their own medals. We also raised awareness about asthma with the Sailor Asthma Show, presented by Aimee Gaestro. The Kapa Haka group from St Mary’s School performed for us, and it was a fantastic experience. Be sure to check out the videos! Our oldest children visited St Mary’s School to see what primary school is like and what they can expect. It’s been a busy month, and we look forward to more enriching experiences for the children. Connections to Te Whāriki (ECE Curriculum) Learning Outcomes: Belonging: Connecting with people, places, and things in their world Contribution: Using skills and strategies to play and learn with others Communication: Enjoying and creating stories
Read more