Gearing Up For Summer! Reading

By Lynsey Fleck, Instructional Coach

​The 2021-22 school year featured many amazing learning opportunities for students, excellent learner growth, and an ever-growing community of learners here at MELA.  It also brought some obstacles, challenges, and many more interruptions to face-to-face instruction than we’d hoped for, which makes keeping the learning going is of extra importance this summer.

Below are a few things that you can do at home to help your child keep his/her literacy skills fresh over the summer:

• Do your best to make time for some kind of reading each day.  This doesn’t need to be a specific amount of time every day, or done at the same time every day.  However you can squeeze in reading–looking at labels while shopping, reading a bedtime story to your child, reading a recipe, having your child read to you–will help your child maintain his/her skills during the summer months.
  
• Make time for storytelling. Students who read and write stories well do so because they understand the structure of how stories work.  After a day trip to the zoo or a family party, try having your child tell you, then someone else about the experience.  Encourage your child to use order words, and ask questions like, “What happened before….?” or “What did we do after we ate cake?” to support your child in correctly sequencing events.
  
• Talk in categories.  When you are doing a regular daily activity with your child, like putting away dishes, name groups of items and give examples.  This might sound something like, “First, we are going to put away all of the silverware.  That includes forks, spoons, and knives.  Let’s do that together.”  You can also do a variation of this by asking your child to predict what items might be needed to do a particular activity.  For example, “We are heading to the pool.  What things should we bring with us?” or “We are going to plant some flowers.  What tools do you think we might need to do that?”
  
• Allow time for drawing.  Encourage your child to take time to draw and/or write whenever time allows.  If your child is very young or prefers to draw over writing, have him/her tell you about the picture or tell a story to match his/her drawing.
  
• Encourage creative play.  Creative, open-ended play, with blocks, legos, dolls, stuffed animals, or other items, teaches children to follow steps, problem-solve, and create storylines.
  
• Talk about what you are doing using specific vocabulary.  As you engage in daily tasks, talk out loud about what you are doing.  Although it seems silly, doing this regularly can significantly improve your child’s vocabulary.
  

And last but not least….
Go places, have experiences, and talk to your child daily.  These things are critical to developing your child’s background knowledge and vocabulary, which have a huge impact on reading success!