BJU Press Blog

oral reading

Read Out for Oral Reading Skills!

by

teaching oral reading skills
An important part of teaching your child to read includes developing oral reading skills.

Mrs. Walker, who teaches reading for BJU Press Homeschool, has created more online videos to help demonstrate the value—and fun—of reading out loud! Here they are with a summary to introduce each one. I’d encourage you to watch them all and find out more about the importance of oral reading.

When Is Oral Reading Important?

The blog recently focused on silent reading as a valuable skill. The videos linked there show how silent reading helps your student focus and fully understand what he’s reading. But what about reading things out loud? Why is that important? And when’s the best time to do it?

While silent reading will help your student form his comprehensive skills, oral reading will help develop his communication skills. Reading a piece out loud will help your student take what he’s just learned and communicate that to someone else. It’s been said that the best way to learn something is to teach it to someone else. Having your child read aloud will not only help him communicate, it will also make sure he understands what he’s reading!

Save oral reading until after your student has read at least once silently. That way, he has already had time to engage with and process the material. Then he can work through sharing that information with others.

How Do I Grade Oral Reading?

As your student begins reading aloud, you’ll want to grade and record his reading. Tracking his progress helps you determine what areas he might need a little more help with. BJU Press has provided multiple oral reading assessments to help with this—along with specific things to listen for as your child is reading.

Again, we recommend you let your child read the material silently first. You may even want to ask him a few questions to make sure he fully understands what he’s reading.

When he’s ready, listen for the criteria listed on the rubric. Be sure to rate each item honestly but fairly, and give your child positive comments on the things he does well. Oral reading is a difficult skill that requires speaking, pronouncing, and communicating the author’s meaning. He has to do these things all at the same time, so be sure to work through the reading with your child lovingly and patiently.

Why Is Poetry for the Ears?

Poetry is a form of writing that is well-suited for reading aloud. It’s a creative means of communicating information in a way that’s more memorable, more pleasant to listen to, and potentially simpler to understand. Many familiar songs are poems that express important truths in ways that stick with us and compel us to look at those truths in new and fresh ways.

Even though poetry is not a heavy component of BJU Press curriculum, we include it because we believe it’s important. Your child will likely encounter it regularly as he gets older. Large portions of Scripture are poetry, and we want students to be able to understand it and glean truth from it.

How Do We Perform Dramas at Home?

One more genre that’s meant to be both read and heard is theater! Performing dramas at home is a fun way to teach your student many important skills that he will use for the rest of his life. Public speaking, job interviews, and singing in a choir are all opportunities that doing theater at home will prepare him for.

Theater can also teach your child empathy. As he gets ready to be in a play, he’ll have to learn his lines, create a character, and explore why the character made the decisions he did. Being able to understand a fictional character’s motives will help your student interact with others.

You may also want to have your student go off-script and put things in his own words—which will demonstrate whether your child really understands everything that he’s performing!

We hope these videos have made it clear why reading things out loud is such an important life skill for your student. The more he is able to both understand and communicate what he reads, the more prepared he will be for communicating effectively in whatever positions God is preparing him for.

• • • • •

Matt recently graduated with an MA in communication studies and currently works as a freelance writer. He attributes the wild variety in his current opportunities to the exploration his parents gave him through the homeschooling experience. He enjoys theater, the gym, and choral music and will rarely say no to a cold glass of sweet tea.

6 Books for Curious Preschoolers

by

Since we have a little one on the way, I decided to get a head start and shop for some books that my son and I can read together over the next few years. I found some great options for curious toddlers and preschoolers. I like these books because they cover everyday things that children interact with and love to learn about. They’re simple—the kind of book you can go back to over and over again and never get bored.

Freight Train by Crews

Less is more. Modern illustrations and minimal text leave the door wide open for mom or dad to inject their own “choo choo” effects as the train barrels down the tracks toward its destination.

Amazing Airplanes by Mitton and Parker

Planning a trip? This fun book about airports and airliners will make your preschooler an expert before check-in. I would have loved this as a curious kid who was fascinated with the baggage-claim carousel.

City Signs by Milich

The title says it all. This book is nothing but phtographs of signs, signs, and more signs. Ever wonder how some kids figure out what they all mean before they can read?

Hands: Growing Up to Be an Artist by Ehlert

This very creative book focused on making things by hand has photographs that show raw materials, tools, and finished products of various crafts. It explains (in simple terms) how the object was made. A great learning tool!

Meet the Orchestra by Hayes

If you’re like a lot of parents, you probably play some classical music for your kids. This book identifies a wide range of musical instruments and the sounds they make. It’s perfect for reading while listening to your favorite compositions.

If Everybody Did by Stover

This one is a favorite among parents around our office. It answers that age-old question, “What would happen if everyone did that?” Silly illustrations teach valuable life lessons. A must-read for every child.

I’m looking forward to reading these books with my child to capture the many benefits of reading together. I hope my sharing them will help your family find many hours of enjoyable reading time.

Have book recommendations? I’d love to hear them! Drop them in the comments below.

Image Source

How to Develop Your Child’s “Thirst” for Reading

by

Do any of the readers at your house fit one of these categories?

  • They can read, but they don’t like to.
  • They have difficulty selecting books they think they will like.
  • They can’t navigate the reading level of books on topics they’re interested in.

Reading skills may be one part of the issue at hand, but another part has to do with the need to develop a love for the written word—information that serves a need, humor that tickles a funny bone, or simply a story that can be enjoyed or appreciated. If reading is hard and seems to have little benefit to a developing reader, reluctance is a reasonable response, even if not the response you want to see.

Love for the written word is a love you cannot force on someone else. We all know the saying “You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink,” and that may be where you are in attempting to turn your child into a satisfied reader. So let’s add a corollary: “You can put salt in his oats.”

Reluctant Readers & Salty Oats

Book Selection

Here are some proven ideas about how you can develop a thirst for reading by how you choose books.

  • Visit the library regularly so that your reader is comfortable there. Allow your child to select his or her books for leisure reading. The reader gets to choose; the parent gets to approve (or redirect, if necessary). Pay attention to what is being selected to understand where interests lie.
  • Look for books that are:

True stories—adventures, events, biographies

Factual—science- or history-related books in the nonfiction section of the library

Hands-on guides—project or craft instructions

Adventure novels with fast-paced, action-driven plots

Topics your reader is passionate about

  • Look for books with:

Short chapters

Accessible sentence structure (not overly long or complex)

Plenty of white space between lines and in the margins

Comfortable font size

Illustrations that are appropriate to the age of your reader (not off-putting to your reader because they seem juvenile)

  • Ask for title recommendations—Learn what has engaged other readers who have similar interests as your own readers. Consider, for example, a new title from JourneyForth that your reluctant reader might enjoy: Nick Newton Is Not a Genius features a merely average boy from the imaginary country of Thauma. Nick’s not brilliant like his mom and dad or a child prodigy like his sister, but he doesn’t let that stop him from uncovering the mysteries of a clockwork factory or revealing a war hero’s greatest secret.

Book Engagement

And you may be able to create a thirst for good books by trying out these ideas for getting your reader involved in reading.

  • Read aloud—Among the many benefits of reading aloud is the ease of being captivated by the words and the story, which becomes its own reason to learn to read independently. (Note: The age range for listening to books is from birth to age 102, and that end age is flexible.)
  • Listen to audio books—This is another way to “read aloud” with the added benefit of hearing some well-produced dramatic presentations. Many audio books can be checked out as digital downloads through your local library system with apps from OverDrive® or hoopla.
  • Read cooperatively—You and your child share the reading, alternating paragraphs or letting one read the narrative and the other the dialogue (what the characters say). Break the text into manageable bits. You lift part of the reading load while your partner views the words you’re vocalizing.
  • Read for fun—Pack up a blanket and some books (food optional), and go on a book-nic. Sit, lie, or sprawl at a local park or in your backyard and just read.
  • Read shorter works like magazine articles, short stories, or poetry—Sometimes the sheer volume of a book can be daunting, so remove that concern.

Do you have salty oats ideas that have helped your reluctant readers? We’d love to hear from you.

• • • • •

Nancy Lohr is acquisitions editor at JourneyForth, a division of BJU Press. She has edited dozens of books over the last twenty years and is a writer as well, having authored two historical novels for children, curriculum stories and articles, and numerous book reviews and articles for parents and educators. Nancy was an educator and children’s librarian before moving into publishing, and she loves to see young readers develop into capable and satisfied readers.

How to Teach Early Writers Through Storytelling

by

painting of Little Red Riding Hood in the forest with the wolf

One day when I was a young child, my mom asked me to tell her the story of Little Red Riding Hood. She wrote down my version of this classic children’s story, and I still have the paper today. As I read it, I laugh at my simple expressions to describe the characters and candid explanations of what happened. Here’s one of my favorite lines from my version of “Little Red Riding Hood:” “Her and the boy got some rocks and then they put them all in the wolf and then they took him outside and they swinged him and falled him to the ground.”

It’s silly, I know.

Can you think of an imaginative tale that your child recently told you? These simple (and often silly) stories preschoolers share can not only make us laugh but also impact their writing skills. Developing good writing skills begins with the thought process.

Thinking It Through

Having meaningful conversations with your child is an important first step. Does your child communicate verbally with unfinished phrases or with complete thoughts? Increase her critical thinking and speaking skills by asking questions that require her not only to give you a literal answer but also to interpret situations or actions, to draw a conclusion, or to express her enjoyment.

Getting these kinds of responses from your child can help her learn to compose complete sentences in her head. As your child starts expressing herself in a logical way, it’s time to explain the connection between speaking and writing.

Putting It on Paper

Writing is just talk written down. This insight is best illustrated for a young child when you write down her stories on paper. Just as when Mom recorded my version of “Little Red Riding Hood” word for word, you aren’t so much concerned about your child’s grammar (that will come later) as you are with making sure her thoughts are whole and logical. Reading the story back to her is important for two reasons.

First, it allows your child to hear exactly what she has told you and to make any corrections. We can’t always trust ourselves “when something doesn’t sound right,” but revising by reading aloud is a good practice to develop. Most importantly, however, reading back the written story allows you to introduce another element of language arts—reading—to your child as you show how written stories can be shared with other people.

Practicing the Skills

As your child grows in her ability to form letters and write words, create stories together by starting sentences for her to finish. It’s a great way for her to finish complete thoughts with her own hand. This practice allows your child to see you model writing a sentence or phrase. When her handwriting skills are more advanced, ask your child to write a complete thought herself. If there’s enough space have her include a picture too! Encouraging creativity but providing the support your child needs to write out her own story is the key to her enjoyment of writing.

After your child begins first grade, introduce her to the five-step writing process. The two of you can take a few days to focus on these steps and complete a project together. Your modeling the progression of steps will help clarify them and give your child an example to follow. Even a simple activity like journaling to each other can give your child regular practice in writing (as well as reading) and allows her to see good writing modeled. Through your involvement, she will learn proper verb tenses, punctuation, spelling, and so much more! By the end of the year, your child will probably complete a writing project all on her own.

What tools are you using to intentionally guide your young child’s writing (and thinking) skills? You can find similar learning ideas like these in BJU Press’s Focus on Fives program as well as Phonics & English 1. Preparing your child to be a strong writer begins right now.