Reading With The Baby

My youngest son is 8 months old now. He's so active and likes socializing with people around him. He will put his smiling face when his sisters are playing something in front of him and babbling all the time with his funny voice.

my youngest son read with his sisters

Since he was a little baby, i always  think it's a very good idea to take him to regular learning activities with his  big sisters. One of my daughter's favorite activities is reading together every evening. I set regular reading time to develop my children's  skills in reading and as well as to encourage their reading habit. What we usualy do is sit together in our living room with books chosen by the children. Usually, my eldest daughter would take the first turn to read the book out loud, the others including me and the little baby listen to her. The younger sister would then take turn after she finished reading. So far, i see that this activity becoming an effective way to learn. For example, whenever my daughter  finds new words, she asks me the meaning of the word and at the same time, I also improve her pronunciation. Since i have three chidren,  it becomes more efficient in time as well. Moreover, the children really love reading time, since they can also discuss the books with me after they read it.

How about the baby? As he can't read by himself, i usually read for him, or in other time, my daughters will do it. I believe, reading to my baby would bring many benefit in helping him to grow and learn .  By reading to him, he can learn how the word sounds, see what the alphabets looks like as well as learn how the book feels by touching it. This, I believe, would develop closeness and the feeling of safety between me and my baby. When i hold him and sharing a book, it becomes a very special time. I know my baby will learn that reading is important when i hold him and show him  pictures in a book. He will also learn that reading time is a "feel good" time. He will start to learn about the world and develop his thinking skills from looking at pictures and hearing the words.

From one article in Parenting south Australia i read that there are several things to manage before we put our baby into reading activity:

Choose a time when we are relaxed and have time. Make reading time an every day activity that stays special as our baby grows older.

Find a comfortable chair and hold our baby comfortably in our arms or on our lap.

Hold the book so we and our baby can look at the pictures. Point to the pictures and say what they are. Try to change the tone of voice when looking at the pictures and try to sound really interested. For example, when we look at the ball we say, " Look, here is a ball" in an exciting voice. We can use the words in the book or our own words when describing the picture.

Watch how our baby responds. See when they shows interest in what they  likes, and responds accordingly.  For example, when they show interest to a picture of a ball, we can respond, "oh, you like that ball?" and so on.

When the baby starts to shuffle or look away or show us that she or he has had enough, stop and try again later.

Remember that singing and talking to our baby, long before he or she can understand the words, are very important to our baby's growing and learning.

Now,  my baby officially become the  newest member in our reading time. He seems to enjoy the reading time with his sisters and hopefully he can continue this habit as he grows up.