Preschool and nursery children

There are lots of simple things you can do at home to help your child be ready for reading when they start school.

1. Spend time enjoying books together - talk with your child in your home language and encourage them to notice and point things out in the pictures. Be led by your child's interest even if that means going back and looking at the same page several times. Children remember what catches their attention. 

2. If you are working, why not get other members of the family involved - you can ask grandparents to read over Zoom for example.  Make sure they chat about the book as they read.

3. The children who come to our Early Literacy Classes love to sing and so do we!  Lots of nursery songs provided by your favourite CBeebies characters can be found here.  Encourage them to sing along, clap and dance.  Children learn new words more easily when they come with a tune, a rhythm and a rhyme.

4. Play a listening game - before a child can learn to recognise and hear different letter sounds, it is really important that they can recognise ordinary sounds.  When you are out on your daily walk, why not play a game together to see if you can hear and name sounds such as birds singing, a car or motorbike? And if you are indoors, can you hear and recognise the kettle boiling, the toilet flushing or a knock at the door? 

5. We love a picture book at Learn to Love to Read.  And picture books can be for all ages.  Take a look at Picture Book Party and you can download lots of activities linked to your favourite books.  

6. If your child is already learning their sounds at nursery, you may want to practice them at home.  There are a lot of apps out there but many are a bit casual in their pronunciation of the sounds.  Does this matter?  Well, yes, because correctly pronouncing their sounds helps your child blend and form words when they learn to read.  Check out the popular Alphablocks on iPlayer or online.  It's not perfect but we think it is one of the best.  

7.  The brilliant CLPE has made available a selection of authors reading books aloud.  The Centre for Literacy in Primary Education is the source of all knowledge and expertise when it comes to children's literature.  They promote the very best books for children - both new and old.  They have set up a YouTube channel so you can put your feet up and know that your child is listening to some of the very best.

8.  The library may be closed but everyone can access their ebooks, audiobooks, newspapers, magazines and music.  Register online here and then send the temporary code to [email protected].

And please do drop us an email if you have any questions - we will try our best to help or make suggestions.  And you can keep up to date by following us in all the normal places!