Article from BBC News

Reading to children has long impact, says OECD study

Parents and children reading together at the start of school makes a long impact, says study

Children whose parents frequently read with them in their first year of school are still showing the benefit when they are 15, says an international study.

An Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development analysis examined the long-term impact of parental support on literacy.

Discounting social differences, the study found children with early support remained ahead in reading.

It found a strong link between teenage reading skills and early parental help.

Talking together

The OECD analysis, based on teenagers in 14 developed countries, found that active parental involvement at the beginning of school was a significant trigger for developing children's reading skills that would carry through until they were teenagers.

On average, teenagers whose parents had helped with reading at the beginning of school were six months ahead in reading levels at the age of 15.

The report says that parents did not have to be particularly well-educated themselves for this impact to be achieved.

What was important was that parents read books regularly with their children - such as several times a week - and that they talked about what they were reading together.

This parental involvement overrode other social disadvantages and in some countries could represent more than a year's advantage in reading levels at the age of 15 compared with children whose parents rarely read books with them.

The study, which draws on data from the international Programme for International Student Assessment tests, also found a link between teenagers' reading skills and continued engagement with their parents.

Everyday family get-togethers, where parents and children talk, could influence school performance, says the research.

"Eating main meals together around the table and spending time just talking with one's children are also associated with significantly better student reading performance in school," says the OECD report.

(This article is from http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-15639642)

The article above is a perfect example of why parental attitude is so important! 

A Facebook Questionnaire

Recently on Facebook, we asked our friends and family the following question: Who was the first person to approach the subject of reading with you? Were your parents helpful, and did their attitude have an effect on your reading ability, and enjoyment, today? 

These are the answers we received: 

As you can see, many of these people had their parents, or their grandparents, reading to them at a young age. Many of them also say that it helped instill a love of reading within them. For example, as Kim Tatman says, "That built my love for books at a super early age and also is the reason, I think, that I began reading at a very early age." Her positive experience with her mother and brother was a great starter for her development of reading. 

Stacey Fletcher states that in first grade, she remembers how "the words just came together and made sense, like something clicked and I LOVED it". By listening to her teacher read, she began to develop many language skills which helped her learn to put the sounds together. These language skills are skills she still obviously uses today. 

Many of these people are people I know personally, and I know that they also have children of their own. As Stacey said, "I read to both boys nightly when they were small. They both still read for enjoyment, as well as school". Her own positive experience carried over onto her own children. This is a reason why parental attitude is so important! It affects not only one, but two or maybe even more, generations! 

You don't have to be the parent to have an affect on a child. You could be a grandparent, teacher, brother, sister, Aunt, Uncle, anything. The important thing is that we teach these people that they are extremely influential in teaching children to read. Their attitudes and views on reading affect the children in their lives who have not yet learned to read. 

The importance of Parent Attitude

To discuss to importance of learning to read, we created a presentation to help support our views. In it, argues just why parent's helping their children to read is so important! Reading is so important in a child's life, and a parent needs to have a positive attitude throughout the process!

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