Summer Reading is COOL!
by Michelle Heinen
Make sure that your plans this summer include reading! The end of the school year should not signal the end of opportunities to listen to, read, and discuss books. Most students experience a significant drop in reading fluency over the summer holiday. Fluency is important because it is closely tied to comprehension. Young readers who don’t read over the summer break, especially those who are “at-risk, lose critical ground come fall. Some studies suggest that children who read as few as six books over the summer maintain the level or reading skills they achieved during the former school year. More books mean even greater success! Try some of the fun activities below to build reading into your break…and to help your child get off to a great start next fall!
- Limit TV watching to free up time for reading.
- Older students can watch television with the closed-captioning ON and the volume OFF!
- Shop garage sales for inexpensive books or swap books with family and friends so that your children have more books to read.
- Clip out an interesting item in the newspaper and cut the paragraphs apart. Have your child read the paragraphs and put them back in the right order.
- Record your child reading a book and replay it so he/she can listen to their reading.
- Play tag with reading! Begin a read-aloud and tap your child each time you want them to read a word.
- Create a “Family Reading Night” centered on a theme. Plan a meal, games, and books appropriate to your theme.
- Use index cards to label household items.
- Challenge younger students to find letters of the alphabet on everyday items such as street signs and cereal boxes.
- Hide an inexpensive treat that your child will enjoy. Write out the directions to finding it.
- Make books a part of your travel time. Check out your local library for audio books or grab a good read to share as a read-aloud in the car.
