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5 Tips to Strengthen Early Literacy Skills – Primrose Schools

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By Anna Hall 

As a mother of three girls, it has been interesting to watch each of my daughters develop into a reader and writer at her own pace. I remember my oldest daughter resisting my attempts to teach her how to read before she was in Kindergarten and then soaring with reading once she entered her first classroom. I can recall my middle daughter writing her name in sidewalk chalk at age 3 without any instruction and wondering how in the world she knew how to do that. Most recently, I observed my youngest daughter moving all the way through Kindergarten wishing she could read like other children her age, only to take off with the skill mid-year in first grade.

All three of my children were exposed to high-quality preschool environments, nightly read-alouds, and a home environment filled with rich language experiences and print materials. Despite sharing these same environmental influences, their journeys to becoming readers and writers were quite different.

In today’s competitive society, it is easy to think that earlier is always better when it comes to learning, but brain research shows that’s actually not the case. Children’s brains develop at varying rates, just as they grow taller and develop socially at different times. Because maturation of the brain influences learning readiness, normal development for learning to read and write can range from 4-9 years of age. However, children benefit from being read to years before they can read or write on their own.

In order for a child to learn how to read and write, their auditory system and motor skills must also be well-developed. Remember that brain development can be enhanced by the environment, but it cannot be rushed. Children often learn things at different paces, and that’s perfectly normal! The following early literacy tips will help little ones build a strong foundation in reading, writing and other communications skills:

• Talk to children often.  More than 60 percent of parents believe that talking to children starts to benefit their language skills at 3 months or older, when in fact it begins at birth. Start talking to your children at a young age, and as they get older, engage them in conversations about their day, ask them questions, tell jokes and make up stories together – all of these efforts will help them develop important language skills and help with early literacy.
• Make reading together a daily routine. This is one of the most important early literacy tips. Ask children questions about the book as you read, point out familiar letters that match their names and fill your home library with a variety of fiction and nonfiction books. The benefit of reading with your child begins before your child can verbalize words or phrases, so start early to help benefit your child’s long-term language development.  Check out this blog post for answers to some common reading and literacy questions.
• Play rhyming games with children. Car rides are a great time for teaching phonics and helping children develop their auditory systems. Take turns saying a word like “cat” and having your children answer with a rhyming word like “bat.” Then, see how many nonsense words you and your children can come up with that rhyme with the same word (e.g., yat, zat, dat). These types of word games for kids and similar educational games help make learning fun!
• Set up an art/writing table in your main living area. Include a variety of open-ended materials like blank paper, markers, crayons, glue sticks, scissors, envelopes, stamps, paint and play dough. Encourage children to use their emergent writing skills (drawing, scribbling, invented spelling) to create letters, lists and stories. Coloring is also a great way to bond with your child! 
• Provide kid’s activities at home that support motor development. Both gross and fine motor development aid children in becoming effective writers. Encourage children to be active outdoors by climbing, running and skipping to build gross-motor strength and provide lacing, stacking and dressing activities when indoors to build fine-motor skills that will later help with writing. You can find additional activity ideas on our Pinterest.

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8+ Ways to Support Language & Literacy Development in Early Childhood

Best Practices

Teaching Strategies

August 3, 2021

It’s never too early to nurture children’s development of language and literacy skills. Even at a very young age, experiencing different genres of books, hearing stories from the adults who care about them, and exploring books alone or with peers helps them learn how to listen to and understand language and how to share their thoughts, ideas, and feelings.

Below we highlight eight ways to support language and literacy skills development in your own early childhood classroom.

1. Capture children’s interest before you read.
   Have children sitting on the edge of their seats before the story even begins! Before your next read-aloud, take a moment to get children interested by providing an exciting overview of the story they’re about to hear. Not sure what this looks like? Below, Vice Chair of the Board Kai-leé Berke provides a few examples so you can see this technique in action.
   
2. Introduce vocabulary during a read-aloud.
   Select a few words to highlight and define for children before you begin the read-aloud. Choose words that are important to understanding the meaning of the story and then define the words as you read. You can define words during a read-aloud by pointing out part of an illustration that shows the meaning of a word, showing facial expressions or moving your body in a way that provides explanation, or giving a brief definition.
3. Share the see-show-say strategy with families.
   See-show-say is an easy, 3-part strategy that you can share with families for conducting read-alouds at home. In the below video, Breeyn Mack demonstrates how adults can invite children to see, show, and say what they’re experiencing in the story.
   
4. Highlight children’s favorite books.
   Highlighting children’s favorite books during read-aloud time is a great way to get them engaged and keep their attention. Encourage children to talk about their favorite books and share their recommendations with others. Keep sticky notes and pencils in the Library area so children can identify their favorite books. Ask them to write their name on the sticky note and then place it inside the book’s cover; then, at read-aloud time, you can point out that this book is Charlie or Lia’s favorite.
5. Establish read-aloud routines.
   Young children thrive with consistent, predictable routines, so it’s important to establish regular times for reading. We recommend scheduling time for read-alouds at least twice a day.
6. Read in small groups.
   To get the most literacy learning out of a read-aloud experience, make sure you take the time to read to children in small groups. Research shows that children who hear stories in small-group settings develop stronger comprehension skills, ask and answer more questions, and comment more on the text. So while you’re probably already reading aloud to large groups of children, try to find time for these small-group interactions, too!
7. Support children who are learning two languages.
   To support dual-language learners, include books and recorded readings in children’s first languages and wordless books in your classroom book collection. Whenever you can, read the story in the child’s first language before reading in English.
   
8. Start early! Read with infants and toddlers.
   Make reading physically interactive by inviting children to hold the book and turn the pages, if they are physically able, or offering them a toy to hold while you’re reading. Focus their attention by pointing to and naming the things in the pictures. And be prepared to read the same books over and over again—very young children thrive on routine and repetition.

Below, Natalie demonstrates what a read-aloud could look like in a real classroom.

To learn more about using read-alouds in your classroom, view our video series and additional resources for proper read-aloud techniques here.

Read-Alouds can happen at home and at school, with children of all ages. Our Digital Children’s Library makes books available, digitally, to children and families at all time. Each book can be read independently or with narration.

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3rd and 4th grade literacy development, recommended books

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Reading time 5 min

Content

1. Tips for parents for home
2. School literacy development
3. List of recommended books for grades 3-4

In grades 3-4 acquired skills allow children to write faster and more competently. The learning to read phase is now complete, and children are now using their new skills to read new books and master new ideas. The ability to read independently gives them joy. They like to read artistic and informative books. However, they still enjoy listening when they are read to, love to add new words to conversations, and show their writing experiences to teachers and parents.

Tips for parents at home

Speaking and listening

1. Talk to your child about school, friends, and activities.
2. Encourage him to share his thoughts and feelings.
3. Listen to his interests, concerns, likes and dislikes. Ask him to justify his opinion.

Read

1. Talk about your favorite books. Give him the opportunity (if he wants to) to read aloud to you.
2. Encourage your child to ask you questions about unfamiliar words found in the text, and explain the meaning of these words in intelligible language.
3. Ask your child to compare the book he is currently reading with other books he has read.
4. Keep reading to him. Discuss the feelings caused by reading the book and the feelings experienced by its characters. Ask your child to guess what will happen next, ask him questions about the plot of the book like “What if ...?”.
5. Find books of interest for your child. Ask him to keep a list of his favorite writers.
6. Set aside a quiet place in the house and special times for reading and doing homework. Cheer up the child.
7. Involve him in the process of making informed decisions.
8. For example, watch a TV program together and choose which programs to watch.

Letter

1. Give your child a place to write.
2. Invite him to try his hand at different forms of writing (stories, poems) and colorfully arrange what is written.
3. Ask your child to show you his work.
4. Encourage him to keep a diary. Let it be his private affair.
5. Publish a family newsletter and share it with friends and family. Let the child be in charge of this publication, and you help him organize "interviews" with family members.

Literacy in school

Speaking and listening

1. Schoolchildren present their ideas to classmates, achieving logical and reasonable information.
2. Express ideas in a variety of ways (discussion, presentation, play, poem).
3. Listen to each other and compare different points of view.
4. Ask questions and agree or disagree with the arguments.

Read

1. Set reading goals and read individually and in groups.
2. Read aloud expressively.
3. Discuss characters, time and place of action, main ideas and details of books read or listened to.
4. Formulate the ideas of the read work in their own words.
5. They read to understand the topic for themselves, making assumptions and conclusions.
6. Establish links between the books you read.
7. They ask questions about the content of the book and, while reading, try to find answers.
8. They offer their own point of view about the books they read, comparing and contrasting information on a particular topic.
9. Use multiple sources to obtain information on a topic and write down facts and thoughts.
10. Identify important and minor details, facts and opinions, themes and different points of view.
11. Compare information from different sources.
12. Read independently for a long time.

Letter

1. They write for various purposes: they invent their own stories, convey information, describe people's lives, create poetic images.
2. Write down fictional stories and talk about themselves to share their thoughts and evoke a response in the reader.
3. Learn to write essays on a variety of subjects using multiple sources of information, such as a well-formed social science report.
4. Get acquainted with the formal structure of the language (rhyme, rhythm, correct choice of words).
5. They study the formal structure of a written text (paragraph) and the different ways of organizing it (cause and effect, chronological presentation).
6. They apply the skills of correct writing (choice of words, presentation of thoughts, use of metaphors and figurative language).

Read also: What is literacy and how to develop it: 35 tips for parents.

Some books you will read to your child, some he will read to you. Ask your librarian or teacher to suggest other interesting books for you. These and other books can be obtained from:

1. in the school library;
2. at the nearest public library.

Grade 3

Grade 4

Based on a publication by New Visions For Public Schools, a nonprofit organization with support from the New York City Department of Education.

Posted by
November 18, 2020

Literacy development among high school students: top 50 best books

Content

1. To help teens develop literacy, empower them to…
2. Teach your teen to read
3. Tips for parents for home
4. School literacy development
5. List of recommended books for grades 9-11

For most young people, high school is a transitional stage, a journey from asserting one's position among peers to realizing one's place in the world. High school students need to achieve a high level of literacy in order to cope with the challenges that will face them in the near future when going to college, getting a job, starting a family.

In grades 9-11, teenagers find meaningful parallels between the books they read and their own lives. They also discover the need to write for more than just school assignments: writing resumes, preparing papers for college, writing a diary. Modern technologies provide unparalleled opportunities to connect with other people and search for information.

To help adolescents develop literacy, give them the right to…

Choices

Teenagers read and write with great desire when they have a choice. They like to choose books for independent reading or a topic for research and decide how and where to share their thoughts on paper. Many high school students begin to read "adult" books.

Voices

They seek public expression and demand that their voice be heard and respected. They find different ways of expressing themselves: from dialogue to the publication of their written work.

Communication

The most valuable experience for high school students is communication with peers, the opportunity to listen to someone else's point of view and exchange thoughts with each other.

Self-confidence

Adolescents experience self-esteem and self-confidence when their level of literacy allows them to become useful members of society.

Teach your teenager to read

How to get your child to read:

1. Offer him books of different genres.
2. Teenagers may prefer information publications, magazines, newspapers, comics to works of art.
3. Accept that everyone reads differently. Restless teenagers can leaf through a magazine, skim captions under photographs, look at illustrations, and sometimes read an article to the end. This type of reading is pleasurable and often arouses the desire to go further.
4. Talk to him about what he is reading. Give him the opportunity to share new ideas and thoughts.
5. Offer him a book that has been filmed. Ask how it differs from the screen version.
6. Ask the librarian to select the most popular works. Teenagers often show interest in books recommended by friends.
7. Offer him books on topics that interest him. Many young people prefer works that resonate with their lives. They like to read with a purpose, not just for fun.
8. Help him set reading goals and achieve them. Teenagers take pride in their success when they achieve their short-term goals.

Tips for parents at home

Speaking and listening

1. Ask questions about what your teen is reading, listening to, or studying. Listen carefully to his answers.
2. Discuss homework.
3. Tell family stories.
4. Draw the children's attention to interesting newspaper stories and talk about them.
5. Watch TV shows together and share your impressions.

Read

1. Have your teen read to younger siblings and teach them how to use the Internet to gather information.
2. Help him find answers to emerging questions, both educational and personal.
3. Make space and time for reading, writing, and doing homework.
4. To learn more about school, ask your teen, read school newsletters, attend parenting events, and teacher meetings.
5. Make sure that all family members are registered in the library, and try to go to books with your child more often.
6. Read the same books over and over and discuss them as equals, not condescendingly.
7. Encourage your teenager to ask you questions about unfamiliar words found in the text, and patiently explain the meaning of these words in intelligible language.

Letter

1. Encourage your child to keep a diary to record their own thoughts and feelings. Respect the privacy of this notebook.
2. Exchange notes with him to share thoughts, doubts and feelings.
3. Provide him with everything necessary for writing (computer, paper, pens and reference materials: dictionaries, thesauri and collections of quotations).
4. Encourage your child to write: take part in essay competitions, send notes or letters to local newspapers.

Literacy in school

Speaking and listening

1. They ask questions, repeating what they heard and expressing a different opinion.
2. They make oral reports on all subjects, confirming their point of view with facts and examples.
3. Listen carefully to your classmates.
4. Discuss ideas with them.
5. Practiced in various types of oral speech: from a casual argument to a speech.

Read

1. Read poetry, fiction and non-fiction.
2. Reading to develop new ideas and ways of thinking.
3. Explore areas related to their own lives, aptitudes and academic interests.
4. Discuss read works in book clubs, literary circles and other events.
5. In all lessons, reading is aimed at mastering the material.
6. Read works are analyzed to establish their completeness, accuracy and impartiality.
7. Already from the ninth grade, they get acquainted with various professions in order to determine areas of activity in accordance with their inclinations, interests and aspirations.
8. Find information in tables, graphs and charts.
9. They draw their own conclusions based on the text they read.

Letter

1. Write in all classes.
2. Collaborate and edit written content.
3. They try themselves in different genres: write poems, stories, essays, letters, diary entries, plays and research papers.
4. They work on the text, reworking and editing the original version to improve the language and style.
5. Exhibit or present their written work for viewing.
6. Bring their opinions on important issues to different audiences, for example, tell their own stories, write letters to newspapers.

Read also: What is literacy and how to develop it: 35 tips for parents.

List of books recommended for children of this age. Ask your librarian or teacher to suggest other interesting books for you.
These and other books can be obtained:

1. in the school library;
2. at the nearest public library.

Grade 9

Grade 10

Grade 11

* Parallel reading - an adult and a child read a book at the same time, each independently, then discuss what they have read.

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