How To Get Your Child To Love Reading

I have an early reader whom I am very proud of.   I do not know exactly how she learnt to read but I believe that our habit of daily reading since she was a baby definitely helped.   Here, in retrospect, I share the activities I believe contributed to her reading success.

• Start reading young.  Introduce books to the babies just like you introduce toys and they will love books as much as they love toys.


• Choose interactive books.  Interactive books can help to attract their attention.  I have recommended some books which my baby liked in my previous post.


• Be dramatic when you read.  Incorporate actions when you read.  For example, when I read The Three Little Pigs to my girl, I will always do an exaggerated blowing action when I come to the part where the wolf was huffing and puffing.  One day, my mom took the book and started telling my girl the story in Mandarin.  When she came to the huffing and puffing page, my girl (who was then probably 8-9 months old) started blowing!  My mom got a shock.  My girl actually recognised the content of the story book and could "tell" the story even though she could not talk!


• Run your finger under the word when you read.  That way, the child can relate your spoken word to the written word.


• Read environment prints to her.  An usual trip to the supermarket or mall or restaurant can be very educational.  You can highlight to the child shop/restaurant names, signages, words in menus etc.  This helps to expose her to words which are all around us.  My girl's first sign of reading was by reading "Exit" signs whenever she sees them.  Initially we thought she was just recognising the sign, but soon after, we realised she could read books. 


• Leave little messages to your child for him/her to read.  I liked leaving short messages to my girl on her doodle board for her to read when she wakes up in the morning or when she's home from school. Eg. "Good morning <name>",  "<name> is home from school", "Today is Monday", "<name> loves to go to school".  

I was not taught phonics when I was a child and I am not proficient in it at all.  Therefore I did not teach my child to read via phonics.  It could be another useful method, I am sure.   Regardless, making reading fun and doing it often definitely would help make reading a breeze!  

Once my child started reading, I began to look for good books for her to read.  That's when I found that finding good books for young readers can be such a challenge!  I'll do a post on some recommendations later.   In the meantime, you can browse The Book Depository which carries a much wider selection than the bookstores here plus free shipping!! 

Fun with Tongue Twisters

My little one and I have had some fun entertaining ourselves with tongue twisters lately.

I introduced her to the "Peter Piper" tongue twister a few days ago.  I thought of the idea to amuse her on a boring afternoon, and we spent a good half hour or so laughing at each other trying to recite the tongue twister.   After some attempts and many laughs later, she could recite the "Peter Piper" tongue twister pretty well, I must say!

Imagine her excitement when the Barney "Playing in the Park" DVD that we just borrowed from the library had a short segment on the "Peter Piper" tongue twister!  She was totally amused and even boasted to me that she could do it very well when BJ couldn't!

It is also amazing how we started recognising tongue twisters everywhere once we started on the topic.   For bedtime reading last night, she picked out Dr. Suess "One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish" for me to read to her.  We have not read this book for quite a while.   I bought this book for her together with Dr. Suess "The Cat in the Hat" many months ago and she had taken a preference for the latter.  "One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish" was somewhat forgotten until I rearranged her books yesterday and she noticed it.  However I believe she will be making me read the book more often because we really had some fun with some of the tongue twisters in the book.

See how clever these are:

"We saw him sit and try to cook.  He took a look at the book on the hook. But a Nook can't read, so a Nook can't cook. So...what good to a  Nook is a hook cook book?"

"In yellow socks I box my Gox. I box in yellow Gox box socks."

"He likes to drink, and drink, and drink. The thing he likes to drink is ink. The ink he likes to drink is pink. He likes to wink and drink pink ink."

"You never yet met a pet, I bet, as wet as they let this wet pet get."

"if you wish to wish a wish, you may swish for fish with my Ish wish dish."

Both my little one and I now have a renewed interest in this Dr. Suess book.  She did not really appreciate the book when i first bought it when she was 2+.  But now that she is 3,   I find that this is a really good and fun book to read for us to read together!