A common mistake that many parents make is to assume that since their child has learned to read, he no longer needs to be read TO.
Jake and I have been reading the Harry Potter books together at bedtime. We started at the end of summer, and just finished up book 3 (which was over 400 pages!) Usually I only read one chapter a night, but sometimes if it's really exciting and I'm not *too* tired, we'll keep going.
The main reason we should still read to budding readers is that while they are capable of reading a certain level of language on their own, they are able to LISTEN and understand at a much higher level. There are differing categories of language comprehension: there's expressive language (what you can verbalize), and receptive language (what you can understand when you hear it.)
Children's listening abilities - understanding vocabulary, the ability to follow along with characters and plots - are much more sophisticated than their reading ability. A child might only be able to read "The dog ran in the grass" on his own, while he could perfectly understand "The enormous dog bounded over the hedge, chasing after the terrified rabbit, who was darting back and forth in a desperate attempt to escape" if someone read it TO him. And this is important for two reasons:
1. Children need to hear great literature and immerse themselves in amazing stories, no matter what reading level they have currently achieved. One of our goals as parents should be to foster an absolute love of language in our children - not just because we need language proficiency in order to function in the world, but because language is so powerful and fascinating. (This also gives them something to look forward to - we're showing them that THIS is the kind of book you have to look forward to when you can read really well!)
2. Children need to be exposed to complex sentence structure and rich, varied vocabularies if they are ever going to master the English language in a meaningful and thorough way. They're certainly not going to hear this from watching T.V., and probably not from having conversations with peers and family members.
In addition, reading out-loud is a great opportunity not just to spend some time with your child, but for exploring what it means to be a reader BEYOND being able to sound out words. When I read to Jake, I can stop mid-chapter and say "I wonder why he said that? Do you think he's planning to . . ." I can also talk about literary devices like symbolism and foreshadowing - but not in a giving a definition and talking theoretically kind of way, I can actually say "Oh, what we just read could be a clue. It seems like what he said is setting us up to discover something later in the book." We can draw connections to what we've already read and talk about themes that keep showing up - whether in this particular book series, or in other books we have read. I can also make a note of how characters treat each other and talk about this in context of how we treat the people in our lives. (Hint: Harry's treatment at the hands of the Dursleys is perfect for this.)
These kinds of conversations are harder to have after your child has done some silent reading and and you are trying to press him for some details - and that feels like homework. Kids don't like to feel pressure to report about their reading; they feel pressured enough just by the PROCESS of learning to read But when you're sitting together and sharing a story because doing so is enjoyable, you never know what you'll discover.
P.S. Jake has made a lot of great comments during our reading of Harry Potter, but the best was this: once when we were reading again about how mean the Dursleys are to Harry, Jake said "I wouldn't want to live with THOSE Muggles." Total win. :)
P.P.S More thoughts from me on this topic:
Types of Vocabulary
Complex Sentence Structure: an example
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