Reading to your child at an early age has many benefits. Reading out loud is one of the most important things you can do to prepare them for school and life. This activity helps in language development, imagination skills, interaction abilities, and comprehension. The long-term effects of parents reading to their children at an early age may also help children become more proficient in writing. By pointing to the pictures while you are speaking the words your child will learn the importance of language. Reading out loud will stimulate their imagination and expand their language and listening skills. Needless to say, there is great value in reading to your children at a young age. Children who learn to read at a young age have an advantage over their peers when entering preschool. Basic reading, explaining characters, how they interact with each other, and how the story unfolds will help them develop an understanding of the text as well and prepare them for future interactions in their life. Helping your child enjoy reading will develop essential learning habits for school thereby allowing your child to learn more quickly and effectively.

Preparing your child for preschool is crucial to their short and long-term success. Growing their love of reading when they are young will offer many rewards. Reading and discussing stories will create personal bonding time and show your child the value of reading.

Reading can provide entertainment and fun for your child. The benefits of reading to your child at an early age can include the following advantages:

• Creates an interest in learning that can continue through adulthood

• Expands children’s vocabulary and helps with correct pronunciation

• Creates a curiosity and desire for reading and learning about new situations and concepts

• Instills confidence in children who are able to read on their own

• Helps with language and speech development

• Develops personal and bonding time with your child and encourages one on one time interaction

• Demonstrates the value of reading and learning

• Prepares your child for school

• Develops communication skills

• Helps in understanding new concepts and situations

• Helps develop a longer attention span

• Teaches children appropriate behavior when they are in future situations

• Builds listening skills

• Helps children understand basic sentence structure and grammar, which can help them become better writers

• Teaches basic knowledge of shapes, colors, numbers, and letters

• Helps develop critical thinking and problem solving skills

• Creates greater understanding of relationships between people and situations

Raising a Teenager

Raising a teenager is one of the most challenging jobs you are going to face. It is also one of the most important times in their lives. It is so imperative that you start recognizing they are not only teenagers they are pre-adults and handled with the right amount of acknowledgement and respect they will rebel. This is when more dangerous and defiant behaviors develop.

It is important to realize that unlike other stages of your child’s life you are laying the foundation for their adulthood. They must learn that some decisions making skills and begin to make some adult choices. While still under the protection of parents.

Accountable for Decisions

It is important that they are accountable for their decisions and they need to understand there are consequences to every decisions they are making good and bad.

Rules need to be concise

Parents need to make rules concise with clear consequences. By the age of 20 the brain is fully develop so before that their brains still have growing to do. They live in the moment where adults can look ahead to weigh their actions against the effect of what choices they make. My 17-year-old daughter is a prime example of this. She and her friends made for the evening and within 15 minutes of leaving her plans can change 3 to 4 times. All it takes is another friend having a “better idea.”

When your children are two and three years old, you learn to pick your battles. Not all battles are worth the fight and tantrums are not worth it. The same thing is true when dealing with a teenager. Be sure it is worth the fight and as far as tantrums, you have not seen anything until you stop your teenager from doing something “all the other kids” are doing.

Do not overreact to everything. They need your strong presents that they know they can count on. They need to know they can depend on you to be there for them even when they think they do not need you. They need to know that no matter what you have their back. They are going to make many mistakes but try to remember you were their age once and you made mistakes. We cannot stop them from making mistakes and there are times they need to make them in order to learn. Good choices make for positive consequences; bad choices make for negative consequences.

Be a good example by following the law to every extent possible. If you break the law even what you view as “just stretching it or saying the law is stupid,” you are showing your lack of respect toward authority. A perfect example would be “the law says teenagers with provisional license cannot drive after 8PM. You think it is a stupid law and you let your child drive home from a game that ended at 8:30PM.” You just taught them that if the law seems of no benefit its okay for them to go against it even if it is a little bit. Do not send that kind of message to your children.

Deal Breakers

There are deal breakers in your teenager’s life. Natural consequences for underage drinking and breaking the law is not appropriate. These things are just not acceptable and can be dangerous. You need to put a stop to these types of behaviors as soon as you become aware of these things emerging.

3-year-olds are learning and developing new skills daily and they love to try new things. Choosing age appropriate activities can help them gain confidence in their new found talents. These preschoolers want activities that are new but are not too difficult, frustrating or long. One toy preschoolers love is a set of wooden blocks. Building toys are the perfect toy to enhance their newly budding skills. Here are 3 suggestions to encourage your preschooler to play with these great educational toys.

1-Build Things Familiar To Your Child

A 3-year-old child likes to reproduce things they know. For example, they might build a house or barn, but not a castle. Your preschooler may make a simple car but not a space ship. They might want to build a dog but do not know how to recreate a dragon. A 3-year-old child’s imagination is developing but he prefers to draw, pretend and build things that are real to him.

2-Build Small Projects

A child of this age still has a fairly short attention span. Don’t overwhelm them with a large number of blocks at one time. A proper amount of blocks for this age would be 60-80 pieces. Investing in a larger set that they can use as they grow is a good idea, but at this age you may want to only get out a limited number of blocks.

Encourage projects they could complete in maybe 5 or 10 minutes. Projects that are too complex or large will make them lose interest. If they lose interest, they may end up just throwing the blocks and that will frustrate you too.

Children of this age use mostly square and rectangular blocks. They don’t use a lot of varied shapes at this age. They will only use a few blocks such as triangles and arches. They will mostly use the basic shapes that are easy to stack.

Keep their projects simple, such as making a small, simple four walled house not a huge mansion with a 5 car garage. If they are having to stack multiple blocks to complete a project, they may lose interest or become frustrated. Let your child build something that he or she can successfully finish. This helps build their confidence. Praise them for their accomplishments. Helping them have successes encourages them to build bigger and more complex things when they are ready. Make sure you are helping them build at their level so they will want to create again another day.

3-Build Low Structures Or Table Top Designs

A 3-year-old still has limited balancing skills. So remember that you don’t always have to build up! Instead of stacking blocks, have them build something that is only one or two blocks high. For example, a row of blocks lined up across the room will make a wonderful train. As they grow and play with blocks more they’ll start adding wheels to their train, a smokestack or cargo in the cars. They could make a row or two of blocks in squares that could be the cages for a zoo, and add their favorite plastic or stuffed animals.

Another fun activity is to let them line blocks up on the table.They can form them into shapes or copy simple outlines of objects with the blocks by placing the pieces flat on the table. You can give them a very simple picture, such as a page from a coloring book. They could line blocks right on top of the outline on the page or have them copy the shape on the table forming the shape of the picture. These table-top designs are really creative. They can make creatures, vehicles, people or their favorite super hero characters. Make funny faces using the different shaped blocks for eyes, ears, and an arch for either a smile or a frown. There is no limit to these creative table top designs.

Many toys today are electronic, “high-tech” and have specific ways to play with them. In our business over the past 5 years, we have noticed children of all ages who do not know what to do with a set of wooden blocks. They will ask ” What do you do with these?” when at a table filled with blocks. They don’t know how to stack them, and become quickly frustrated or uninterested. But educators and researchers and parents know the tremendous value of playing with simple toys that utilize a child’s imagination.These types of toys help them to develop important cognitive and motor skills and help them learn complex science and math concepts. It is important for children of a young age to engage in play with these types of educational toys. Make sure your little one grows up loving to play with wooden building blocks.

Children who are solid readers at an early age are typically well-rounded individuals. Young readers tend to perform better in school, have better language structure, and have a healthy self-esteem image while becoming lifelong learners. Statistics show that nearly 40% U.S. young reader’s particularly low-income families are not achieving basic levels of reading proficiency. The over whelming fear is that many of these young children may never fully participate in American society. These are society’s kids and as educators we have a duty to act and not allow these children to fall by the waste side.

A young children’s mind is like a sponge, they absorb everything. Young children learn the essential skills that will help them broaden their mind to become strong readers. Young children become aware of books and pictures and print from infancy, through toddler years and well beyond their preschool years. As early childhood educators we must get young minds excited about books so young children will become strong readers. Early educators play a significant role in helping to prepare and promote early literacy, reduce reading difficulties, and help prepare young preschoolers for the next grade level, kindergarten. Early educators and parents must read stories, keep stories fun and exciting for everyone. Parents and teachers can act out stories by using props and any fun essential aid to make reading exciting for young children.

Children love to answer questions about his or her favorite character in the story. As educators we should be asking them the important questions about stories being read to them. Another way to achieve successful readers would be to motivate him/her by keeping a visible record for the child. Perhaps some sort of chart or graph that would mark as a record of achievement that they’ve accomplished all on their very own. “Look at what I did!” Children love to be acknowledged for doing things. It gives them a sense of belonging, self-worth as well as build self-esteem and self-image.

Educators must be diligent and continue to work even harder to raise awareness to parents’, motivate the mind of young children, especially children in disadvantage households, we must provide new books into the hands of young children that will renew their mind and help them feel empowered to see over the horizon and begin to explore new possibilities. Educators must tackle literacy issues on a day-to-day basis, encourage families to read together, provide enough resources to inspire families and motivate young minds to enjoy learning to read.

When my first child was about three-and-a-half years old, I decided I wanted to teach her how to read myself. As a first-grade teacher at the time, I may have just wanted to do it myself and not let anyone else do it. I can honestly tell you I am not sure why I was driven to do it, but in the end, I did teach her and I have taught my other two children to read as well.

In this article I will tell you, based on my experiences, why I believe parents themselves can and should take the initiative to teach their children to read. I no longer have any doubt whatsoever as to why and can share six reasons with you.

The first reason I will give you is that by ensuring your child reads well in school leads to early success in school. I learned in teacher school that success leads to more success. Children love to feel successful and will work hard to feel more success. This is the type of cycle I wanted my children and students to experience. And I saw a lot of it using the phonograms. First-graders love recess. There is no doubt about that. But when we were working on the phonograms, we often did not take morning recess and I rarely heard complaints about it. Other teachers would ask me where we were and then could hardly believe it when I told them we were working.

The second reason is that children will be more self-confident students. Imagine your child going to school already knowing how to read. Your child will walk into that school already knowing that this learning thing is not so hard and that they can do it. Contrast with an example of a student who does not yet know how to read and the difficulties faced. Much of life is believing in yourself and teaching your child to read is a good way to get them started believing early. You must know once they have it the odds of losing it are small.

Next, your child will learn so much through the world of reading. You might as well get them started early and let the learning begin. I helped my children choose books to read early on and often made non-fiction books an option. Pretty amazing what their little brains can soak up just because they can read about it. Children can learn a lot by watching TV too, but there is plenty of research that shows people who read are smarter than people who don’t read. Need I say more?

I haven’t talked about the phonograms yet. But teaching your child to read using 70 phonograms makes them understand that words are made up of parts. Research shows that children who understand that words are made up of parts are better readers. It is easy to see why your child would understand that words are made up of parts. You will teach them all the parts using the phonograms.

Another reason to teach your child to read is that you will have no doubt as to how your child learns to read. I’m not saying there aren’t many successful teachers in the world teaching children how to read and that there aren’t many different ways to teach children to read. I’m actually a very firm believer that if the parent is extremely involved and supportive, just about any method will work. What I’m saying is, you get the opportunity to remove any doubt about the process.

And finally, the last reason, which I lean toward as number one as well. This reason involves the joy that you get to experience during the process of teaching your child to read. You will spend many hours with your child during the process, some of it very challenging and some of it very frustrating. But in the end, your child will be reading well and you will have been instrumental in making it happen. When children transition from sounding out all the words to those first few words that become their own, it is a wonderful moment. And then the joy continues as you watch them learn more and more and more words and start reading. You will be amazed at what your child can do once all the phonograms have been learned and they start reading regularly. And it was because you made the choice to make it happen.

There you have it, six excellent reasons for parents themselves to teach their children to read. Success, confidence, knowledge, words are made of parts, surety of method, and finally, the joy that will be experienced. I may not have known why I was driven to teach my children to read, but I sure was lucky to experience all six reasons and I am now driven to help other parents have the same experience.

One of the very best things that a parent can give to their children is a love of learning and reading. Most children, by nature, like to read and will be excited when it is story time. However, some children find it less than thrilling and more of a chore than an adventure. If you find yourself wanting to make reading more fun for your children, follow these simple steps.

Step #1 – Choose the right book!

The very first thing is to make sure the book you are reading with your child is the right one. Check to make sure that the book is age appropriate and that they will understand the subject matter easily. Also keep in mind the length of the book. If a book is too long, your child may find it boring. If it is too short, they may not be challenged enough with it to pay attention. The subject of the book is also important. Let your child pick books that they want to read and that appeal to their interests.

Step #2 – Let the Child Be Involved!

Whether it is turning the page, reading sections, or pointing out their favorite part of the illustrations, let the child be involved. Children are natural born “helpers” and they usually take more ownership of things that they feel they have helped to create or develop.

Step #3 – Lead by Example!

Children will many times follow the example of the people they look up to. If they think that reading is something that is boring or tedious to you, they may lose interest as well. Never rush through a book or give the impression that reading to them is a chore.

Step #4 – Discuss!

When you finish reading a page, chapter, or book, take the time to discuss it with your kids. Ask them questions about the plot, characters, or imagery. Find out what they liked most and if they have any questions or didn’t understand part of it. By having a discussion, you can better gauge what your child is thinking or feeling in regards to the story.

Step #5 – Make it a Habit!

Like most anything else done on a regular basis, reading will become a habit if you do it enough. Pick a time each day and make it a habit to read during that time. If you stick with it, this part of their day will become just as important and routine as eating lunch or going to bed. Once this habit forms, your child will naturally continue to read everyday as they grow older.

As multimedia channels increase and kids become subjected to an increasing stage of facts from all aspects, reading has been replaced in many cases with other stimuli. Despite tablets and e-readers, youngsters truly are not studying as lots these days. As a result, the improvement of reading comprehension has fallen for this reason.

These activities are troubling due to the fact the importance of reading and analyzing comprehension has not fallen. In one demanding statistic, professionals estimate that as many as two-thirds of college students who reach the fourth grade with out studying studying comprehension can also enjoy poverty and/or jail. The specialists do supply us some fantastic information too. Those kids who develop robust literacy skills earn better grades, have higher attendance, and revel in college greater. As adults, literate youngsters pass directly to maintain higher jobs, revel in better income, or even enjoy cognitive decline at a later age.

The Complex Process of Reading

Reading is one of the maximum complicated human mind approaches, wherein we decode symbols (letters) to derive that means. Much extra than words on a page, reading engages the thoughts’s reports, know-how, language, ideals, attitudes, and worldview. Beyond simply recognizing phrases and information them in a sentence, the reader need to be capable of vicinity what she or he reads into a context that makes sense. The most effective manner to grasp analyzing is thru practice, however even giant practice at studying does not assure the development of powerful analyzing comprehension. A discussion approximately what young newbies read helps them to expand their comprehension competencies.

The Importance of Reading Comprehension

As adults, we read for plenty motives. We study for pleasure or to learn about current activities. We read to increase or garner competencies and abilities. Often we examine in the course or context of our job. Unless we’re capable of recognize what we study however, we have little desire of engaging in any of those goals. For kids, the stakes are even better. Learning is cumulative, specially for young kids, and each new piece of records builds on those that came before it. For gaining knowledge of to development, your toddler have to successfully recognise what she reads.

A commonplace trouble in colleges and the place of job nowadays is referred to as useful illiteracy, wherein an character does possess the potential to study however, due to the fact comprehension is poor, very little information or value is gained.

Helping Your Child Increase Reading Comprehension

Parents and caregivers can assist a infant increase his studying comprehension capabilities in many methods. Talking with the child about his information of what he is simply study is critical, but the process can start even before the kid opens a ebook. Look on the title with him and speak what the e-book is probably approximately. Ask her what she knows already approximately the problem, or what she thinks she might analyze. Encourage him to talk about passages or principles that confuse him. Finally, ask her to narrate what she reads to her very own experiences. You can find a diffusion of useful academic programs to beautify your baby’s reading comprehension. This is important for beginning readers however additionally for suffering younger readers. Finding ways to make reading fun in your baby, even as helping him or her develop these essential skills, will nearly make sure a lifetime of leisure in the enterprise of an amazing e book.

A infant learns continuously. Every new revel creates possibilities for obtaining life lessons. Preschool teaches and reinforces abilities in a nurturing way. By interacting with each different and receiving gentle guidance from teachers, preschoolers learn treasured talents, features, and values.

Making Good Decisions

When younger children engage with each other, there are lots of opportunities to learn from choices which might be made. As they play and work together on an interest, they quickly decipher which behaviours are proper and which are not. They get to check limitations whilst seeing the direct consequences of their moves. Through their interactions, they study, as an example, that cooperation is met with approval while pushing or grabbing leads to lost privileges. By experiencing the final results of different choices, kids learn the way to make correct decisions in a secure setting.

Communicating Well

Through songs, play, and age-appropriate classes, young students learn how to speak nicely. In addition to obtaining simple writing skills, they’re get trained on how to speak in entire sentences, a way to verbally ask for what they need, and a way to give an explanation for their point of view. Each day provides new possibilities to verbalise thoughts. Communication can be easy at first, however with practice even the quietest preschooler will quickly recognise a way to speak correctly one-on-one and in a group.

Making Friends

This vital lifelong skill can blossom in preschool. Young youngsters analyse the essentials that forming a friendship. They determine out the way to be a great pal, and they have the opportunity to revel in friendships with classmates who may also have one of a kind interests, skills, and backgrounds.

Helping Others

Children have a natural desire to help others. When preschool instructors skilled in classroom dynamics and human behaviour harness this innate inclination, an infant can display behaviours like compassion and empathy. In class, children are endorsed to assist each other. When a preschooler sees classmates helping each other, it strengthens that innate preference to help others.

Sharing

A preschool setting also strongly nurtures sharing. A pastime like colouring, for example, naturally creates the opportunity to proportion crayons. Playing with toys, puzzles, and building blocks also results in informal training on cooperating and sharing, in addition to endurance, taking turns, and running together as a group.

Developing Confidence

The early classroom placing gives exquisite opportunities to try new matters and, through the years, excel at them. This procedure of trying something again and again till attaining achievement is the manner to increase confidence. Also, activities that supply a infant the chance to make contributions in a visible, significant way construct self-confidence.

Participating in display-and-inform or serving as a study room helper can growth and strengthen a feel of self belief in every preschooler. This can-do attitude developed early in life will carry over into number one and secondary grades to offer every baby the vital inner energy to embody existence with a bit of luck at every degree.

We all get frustrated sometimes that we can’t get our kids to eat healthily. We also know that kids are picky eaters and an occasional eating of greens will not make them a vegetable fan. All we need to do is be more creative and even use sneaky methods to get them accustomed to eating healthy.

It is a well know fact that children who have healthy eating habits in early life are more than likely not to suffer from obesity in their later years and the chronic illnesses are much lower as well.

Here are some tips for getting your kids to eat healthier meals:

1. Process vegetables in a food blender and mix them up with your sauces and dressings. For example, you can put broccoli, spinach and kale in the blender or food processor and mix them up with a homemade pasta sauce or other sauces.
2. spiralled vegetables are now a good alternative to pasta, use them instead of the normal pasta,
3. puree some vegetables and mix them up with beef hamburgers. This method can also be used for homemade meatloaf and meatballs.
4. Processed fruit snacks are full of sugar and preservatives. Invest in a food dehydrator and make your own fruit snacks.
5. For those hot summer days your kids will be loving cool treats. Make them fruit and veggie pops by pureeing fruits and vegetables and freezing them in popsicles.
6. Pack lunchboxes with kid-friendly fruits. Those little oranges and tangerines in kid-friendly sizes are always a hit, so include plenty of them when you pack their school lunches. Baby carrots and sliced apples with dipping sauces are other healthy lunchbox staples.

So with a few sneaky methods to introduce vegetables in your kid’s diet, you can rest assured that your child is getting all the nutrients from the vegetables you introduce in their meals.