As a parent one of the greatest gifts we can give our children is exposure to books and reading. A heartbreaking scene for a teacher is to have a first grade student that is linguistically poor, or knowing 5000 words. This is so sad because it says that a child has not been exposed to books, travel, museums, or worst, conversations that involves deep thought and discovery.
We have an obligation to, at the very least, provide books to our children. Being a positive example will prove a great way to encourage the love of reading. Asking questions and being involved on a knowledge quest with your children can be so rewarding.
Children who begin school with a limited vocabulary are at risk of having academic challenges. Vocabulary acquisition is gold for children. It allows them to be linguistically rich. An example of this is a student entering first grade knowing 20,000+ words. It gives them access and understanding of tier two or even domain specific tier three words. Exposure gives them background knowledge that allows them to understand text and passages that linguistically poor students will struggle understanding.
This large vocabulary gap will continue to grow and, unfortunately, hurt children that are not on par with their peers. I cannot tell you how many times a student has had trouble testing because they don’t understand a passage. Most passages that appear on benchmark test are easy to understand for students that have been exposed!
So what am I saying? Books, ebooks, travel, museums, conversations that involves some back and fort are invaluable. Your child being linguistically poor or rich will be the foundation of their academic life. It is never to late to implement discovery and literature to our children.
Felecia is an educator and a blogger. She is a published author children’s chapter book Trudy, Swimming Against the Odds available on Amazon. Felecia resides in Atlanta, GA
http://www.feleciatucker.com/