I discovered a great article called Promoting Language With Books. The full article can be found here. But I wanted to highlight a few of their key points.
- Children need to hear many words often.
- Children learn words when they are interested
“Books spark children’s interest because they have illustrations with bold colors and topics of interest to young children. Many children’s books offer imaginary topics (such as pirates, princesses, or dragons) that encourage conversation between parents and children. In addition, it’s easy for children to show their parents what interests them in a book, both with and without words (by pointing, gesturing, or drawing attention to a picture).”
3. Children learn best when adults are responsive to them.
“Much research has shown that young children benefit from interactions with adults who do the following while interacting with them:
- continue children’s topics by responding to what they say with a related comment or question
- express a positive attitude
- use a variety of words and sentences [1]
- cognitive (thinking) skills
- achievement of developmental milestones
- school readiness
- vocabulary
- math abilities [1]
- it’s easy to join focus during a book and notice what a child is looking at and talking about. The calm, visual nature of the activity focuses the child, and this makes it easier for the adult to follow the child’s lead and respond to his or her interests.”
I really think this last one has a huge impact and is really the most important one. When a parent is interacting with a child and being responsive to them, they are not only making their kid smarter, but they are being a great parent and creating memories with their child. I’ve realized this with Harper. The more I actually play with him and interact with him the more well-behaved and happier he is. Most of the time when he is acting like a crazy little monkey, it’s because I’m not giving him my full attention.
4. Words are learned when meanings are made clear
It’s not enough to simply use new words during conversation or read them in a book. Children need to learn what words mean, and this happens when parents:
- explain what a word means
- point to pictures
- use their voice or gestures to explain the meaning of the word (for example, using a quiet voice when reading “he whispered in her ear…”)
- use a new word within a related context (e.g. talking about an “ankle” when having a conversation about body parts) [1]
- parents can use the illustrations to explain the meaning of new words
- the conversations that occur while looking at a book offer opportunities for parents to pause the story and explain what a new word means
- books often use the same new word on several pages of the book. This provides several opportunities to hear a new word used in a variety of sentences, and this helps children understand the word’s meaning.
I saw this little chart on facebook today and while it’s a great little resource for writers, I thought what a great tool for parents!
When talking with your kids use this Very Useful Vocabulary Tool.
“Harper, do you see that big truck? That truck is very big. That’s a massive truck. The big truck is humongous. Do you see it? Wow what a humongous truck! Look how massive those tires are. Do you see them?”
Another great way to have conversations with your child is to find those look and see books.
Usborne has a few books that spark conversations or help parents interact with their child through a book.
d5367.myubam.com/p/4459/very-first-book-of-things-to-spot
http://d5367.myubam.com/p/5562/very-first-book-of-things-to-spot-out-and-about
These books are fantastic because there are so many interesting details on each page. And as an added bonus there are “parent prompts” on each page. These are helpful things to say to your child as you are reading the book. Things like:
“Spot a cat wearing a scarf.”
“Who’s riding a bicycle?”
“Find a duck driving a car.”
“Which car has no wheels?”
And I swear this book taught my son the emotion of sadness. On one page it says, “Can you see an unhappy cloud?” And on another page it says, “Which monster is sad?”
After that every time he sees someone who is sad, he will say in a sad empathetic way, “Mommy. Awe. Sad.”
Here’s another great conversation sparking book.
http://d5367.myubam.com/p/5543/whos-ready-to-play
Who’s Ready to Play? is just one of fifteen questions in this delightful picture quiz book for young children. There are twenty-four different animals and things to find on every page. Both a memory game and a thinking game, Who’s Ready to Play? will keep toddlers and preschoolers actively engaged in books and reading. A test of observation and visual clues, it will have children creating their own stories as it familiarizes them with new words and activities.
Lastly, I found this super cute book that is slightly higher level. I'm excited to try this book with Harper. It's sort of like the first book of things to spot, but this one will require kids to use higher level inferencing skills.