Reading Aloud to Young Children Has Benefits for Behavior and Attention

Perri Klass, M.D.:

A new study provides evidence of just how sustained an impact reading and playing with young children can have, shaping their social and emotional development in ways that go far beyond helping them learn language and early literacy skills. The parent-child-book moment even has the potential to help curb problem behaviors like aggression, hyperactivity and difficulty with attention, a new study has found.

After reading this article last night, I decided to read aloud with Đán instead of making him read himself. Afterward, he said, “Can we do this again tomorrow?” For weeks, I stopped doing Let’s Read with him because he showed no sign of improvements. He struggled sounding out words and yawned profusely. I was getting frustrated as well so we took a long hiatus. Now we need to take a step back and read aloud together. His teacher also assigned him a word ring. I thought he was doing great until I realized that he memorized the words instead of learning to read them. He just spat out a word before I could flip to the next one. He struggled when I picked the word randomly.

Xuân has shown interests in reading. He loves it when we read together. He also interrupts us whenever I read with Đán. Now that we read aloud, he can join us. Đạo likes to read, but it is his last resort. He reads to distract himself from eating. At night, I give him some extra time to read before we go to bed. He read his book and I read mine. Before we knew it, the time was 10:30 pm.

Bonjour Vietnam