Archives for March 2020

Many households have two parents that work full-time outside the home. In addition, single parents have to do the role of two parents, hold down full-time jobs and manage kids and the home. Time is precious, and when work ends, dinner has to be prepared and all the homework and chores need to be completed. 

Finding extra time to help children read is really difficult. If your child is having trouble with reading, you may be at wit’s end and wondering “how can I help my child read when I don’t have time?”

Here are a few ways to help your child when time is crunched, your mind is frazzled and you’re trying to do it all.

1.   How Can I Help My Child Who is Struggling to Read? When Time is Limited, Create a Schedule.

Tasks are overwhelming if they come at you as a big list instead of a schedule. You don’t have to do everything right when you get home. Instead, make a schedule and stick to it. At 6 p.m., maybe you make dinner. At 7:30, maybe it’s time to review homework and for evening baths. 

Not every family will have the same schedule, and some days you may be shuttling kids to sports, dance or other activities and this makes everything even more hectic. Don’t make the evening harder for you. Sit down, list everything that needs to happen each night and create a master schedule.

For reading, you may aim to help your child during a bedtime story. For many parents, scheduling quiet reading time at night works well and might create less stress.

2.   No Weekday Time? Read During the Weekend!

Yes, your child’s teacher may assign nightly reading homework. However, a great suggestion for managing those minutes is to utilize the weekend for reading goals. Most parents have free time (and much less stress) during the weekends, so this is the perfect time to sit quietly with kids and help them with reading.

Clock those minutes and carry them over during the school week. Reading is reading. Kids may prefer reading when it’s for fun versus being told to read as an assignment.

3.   How Can I Help My Child’s Reading Level?

Practice, practice, practice! For younger kids who are just learning to read, practice at the grocery store or on errands. Help children sound out words on products or on signs.

Or pack a book and read quietly at a restaurant or while waiting for an appointment. Instead of letting them play on a phone or device, help them read a book instead. Get in the habit of keeping books in the car or in bags. That way, you always have the tools with you!

4.   How Can I Help My Child With Struggling With Sight Words?

Sight words are everywhere. When you’re out with kids, have them look for sight words. Use reading games to help them gain phonetic proficiency and skill. See how many sight words they can find!

5.   How Can I Get My Child to Like Reading?

It’s easy to say that reading should be fun. Unfortunately, when reading is assigned as homework…it may feel like homework. 

To embrace the joy of reading, you can head to the library. Most local libraries host free storytime events for young kids. Some may even include games or crafts. This is a fun way to get kids to associate reading with having fun. Find out when your library hosts storytime and head to the library!

If storytime events are held during work hours, plan your own trip to the library. Allow kids to have their own library cards and let them pick out their own books. Borrowing books helps teach kids responsibility and accountability.

6.   When You’re Overwhelmed…Ask for Help

Your child’s teacher understands that parents are busy. Sometimes, when life becomes chaotic, helping a child who is struggling academically can seem overwhelming. Maybe it’s not even about finding the time but finding out how to help.

When you’re struggling to help your struggling reader, reach out and ask for help. Email your child’s teacher for advice or meet one on one to discuss options for intervention. Teachers are a great resource, and most teachers truly want to help every child. You may find that your child’s teacher is already helping your child or that perhaps your child isn’t struggling as much as you might believe.

7.   What is the Best Way to Teach a Child to Read?

Children learn differently. Some may take to reading easily, others may struggle. In addition, not all methods work for all kids.

If you don’t have time to help your child, and you don’t know how to teach your child how to improve reading skills, a tutor may be an option. And a virtual tutor like Readability could be the best option. 

When money and time are limited, online reading programs could help your child boost reading skills and gain more proficiency. Look for software that offers a built-in tutor like Readability. Our online virtual tutor helps correct errors and provides encouragement, too.  

Age-appropriate stories and appealing visual illustrations keep kids engaged and ready to move on to the next book. Readability progresses with your child, so lessons are never too easy …or too hard.

Want to know if Readability is right for your child? Try it for free for a week…and get reading!

Homeschooling is now the new reality for many kids and parents. With thousands of schools closed because of the coronavirus outbreak, many parents are left to teach their own children and homeschool reading comprehension, math, science, and other subjects.

Reading comprehension is an important skill that many young children learn in the classroom. Mastering reading comprehension is important because children will eventually use this skill as the main way they learn. If your child is struggling with reading comprehension, then they will likely struggle in other subjects and areas as well.

Although parents are not expected to be replacing their children’s teacher at home, they can help make sure their children are staying on track while they are not in school. 

What is reading comprehension?

The simple definition of reading comprehension is the ability to understand what you are reading. However, it is a very intricate process that involves several skills working together.

Reading comprehension is important for your child because it is what will essentially help them to learn new concepts in the future. When they are able to understand what they are reading, they are able to learn and understand new concepts about any subject or theme.

Reading comprehension is composed of these three elements:

• Reading fluency – Reading fluency is being able to read at a natural pace. This involves being able to recognize words easily and quickly. If your child is able to identify words quickly, then they will be able to understand what they are reading easily. 
• Vocabulary knowledge – Vocabulary knowledge is a highly important element of reading comprehension. The more words your child knows and is able to recognize, the better they are able to understand sentences. Sight words are often the first kinds of words your child learns. Sight words are commonly used words in a language and are often those that help with giving meaning in a sentence. 
• Text comprehension – Text comprehension is being able to recognize how those vocabulary words are arranged in a sentence in order to put meaning into a sentence.

How do you teach reading comprehension?

Having your children at home right now does not mean they need to be without education. While parents should not expect to be able to create a replacement for school, they can do educational activities every day.

These activities may help children to continue to learn and create a more interactive version of homeschool. Reading comprehension is something your whole family can practice while staying at home together.

Here are some tips and strategies for families to learn together reading comprehension:

1. Read what your kids are reading- You are probably spending a lot of time with your kids right now. Working from home and having them at home can put a lot of stress on your family. Instead, you can combat this stress by reading books as a family. 
2. Discuss readings – Your family can create stronger bonds and help your children with their reading comprehension by talking about your shared readings. Talking about the reading can help your child understand the texts more and also share what they understood. 
3. Mind Mapping – Using graphic organizers are a great way to help check for reading comprehension. Mind Mapping is one form that is fun and easy to use. Essentially your child organizes their ideas about the text and makes connections between ideas. There are many mind mapping worksheets you can use or even mind mapping apps. 
4. Break the reading into parts – Before your child begins reading something that might be a bit advanced for them, you can help them break the reading into smaller parts so that they are able to read one part at a time. After they read one section you can have them summarize or just discuss what that specific section is about. 
5. Post-its – A simple way for your child to enhance their reading comprehension while they are reading is to simply use post-its. While they are reading they can write some keywords or a sentence about what they understood from specific sections. When they are done they can collect the post-its and you can help them organize them and discuss what they understood from the reading material. 
6. Visualize – Visualizing the reading material is similar to using a graphic organizer. Visualizing the reading material helps your children put what they understand onto paper. You can have them draw what they think the story is about and you can even have drawing contests or have them make a comic version of the story they are reading. 
7. Use reading apps – A great tool that is available to parents that teachers often use in class is a reading app. There are many different kinds of reading apps out there that are all meant to help with the various reading skills your child needs to master.

What is the best app for reading comprehension?

Reading apps are great tools to use for your child when homeschooling There are many reading apps that help with various reading skills. Finding the best app for your child will depend on what they need to focus on improving. However, there are some apps like Readability that can help with multiple skills.

Readability essentially acts as a private reading tutor for your child. The app has a large library of reading materials at various reading levels that are all original content and is constantly being updated. Your child can have the option of having the app read the story to them as they follow along or also they can read the story aloud and have the app listen to them read. With the listening option, the app uses speech-recognition technology to listen to your child read and give them immediate feedback to help them improve. This way your child gets reading practice through listening and actually seeing the text. This will help them improve their reading comprehension quickly.

The coronavirus outbreak might have changed your child’s education for the time being, but it is important that you still continue the learning process at home. Homeschool can be tricky for parents who have never done it before but using a combination of strategies and taking advantage of online tools available to you can help the process be easier for you and fun for your child.

Schools and private reading classes always start out with the idealistic idea of helping every child to read.

However, although the idea is nice, in reality, often there simply aren’t enough resources to give each child the individual attention that they deserve.

Schools have to stick to set budgets and meet certain educational targets. Sure, they do their best, but unfortunately many fall through the cracks in the education system.

With the current Covid-19 (Coronavirus) outbreak, parents are now having to turn their hands to teach at home.

Home classes are mostly online with schools, but there is also a strong need to supplement this with other activities. Teachers spend hours preparing extra materials, but these are hours that parents mostly don’t have.

Reading is a major part of learning, and so we encourage parents to get their kids reading digital books during these challenging times. We understand that books, even digital books, can be expensive.

This is why we felt that another way was needed for helping every child to read for a low cost and without the restrictions of staffing, budgets, or individual book fees.

We’re here to make your life easier, as while they are enjoying reading, you can grab a coffee or your favorite bottle and relax for a while in peace.

How do you help a child to read?

There are many approaches that can help a child to learn how to read. Now that parents and school students are forced to stay home due to coronavirus closings, these techniques can be easily worked into the schedule with parents and carers.

Here are some general ways that you can help your child read at home:

• Start early in a fun way. Read to them, point out words, and encourage curiosity
• Talk to them in a natural way. This allows them to learn more words in natural sentences
• Let them listen to books, read by you or read aloud by an app
• Make reading a fun activity that they look forward to. Consider creating a magical reading zone for them
• Ask them about any stories they know or have recently read. Telling a story in a simplified way can encourage understanding of texts
• Teach the sounds of letters and similar words
• Ask them questions about what they have read. Start simple and progress to more difficult questions

The above approaches help to build skills required for reading.

Re-reading stories actually is incredibly beneficial, as they get to practice words that they know and repeat words that they’ve learned. It can also help to increase confidence, especially when they read to a carer or tutor and get the story mostly correct.

What Are Your Child’s Strengths?

Learning what your child’s strengths are can help with how you approach helping them to read.

If they are talkers, then make them retell the stories they have read. This could help make reading more fun for them. If they love to listen and listen well, then it could be of great benefit for them to be read to.

While their weaknesses also need support, by focusing on their strengths and growing their abilities, you can help to increase their confidence and turn reading into a pleasurable activity.

How to Teach a Child to Read at Home

If your child struggles to read, which is likely to happen at some point in their development, you will probably at least think about how to help them to read. Now that you are spending more time at home, consider trying a reading app like Readability.

In normal times, the problem for most parents is how to balance work-life versus home-life. Today, it is more a struggle between getting your work done at home and having their school work done at home.

Homeschooling can be quite tiring for parents and kids too. Trying to tutor or force learning with no experience or help can be exhausting and it often isn’t fun either.

Thankfully, there is an easier way now, a way that is helping every child to read well. AI tutoring is real, it’s advanced, and it is perfect for struggling readers with busy families.

Why is an AI tutor a good choice today? This is why:

1. Children can study individually with AI support, or with family/carer support.
2. They can listen to stories being read aloud, or individual paragraphs, helping them to understand how words should sound as they follow the story on-screen.
3. The AI never sleeps, so can help to correct their pronunciation whenever they are reading. This is also good because they can practice whenever they want to.
4. Endless amounts of fun and level appropriate stories with an ever-expanding library.
5. Customized reading programs to support their development and interests. The AI carefully makes recommendations for each reader.
6. Available anywhere on mobile devices such as tablets and smartphones.
7. Colorful images help to hold attention and also deepen their understanding of the story.
8. Parents get detailed real-time reports about the reader’s abilities.
9. Parents can also manage numerous readers from within their plans’ dashboard.

In these crazy, stay-at-home times, helping every child to read is possible with AI tutoring apps like Readability. AI tutors don’t need a salary and are available all of the time, making them a great and affordable choice for children struggling to read.

If you are ready to help your child to improve their reading level, why not sign up for the Readability free trial. You quite literally have nothing to lose and your child could benefit greatly and learn to love reading.

Independent reading is when your child is able to read consistently with minimal to no help. Most kids start to learn to read independently in school with teachers being there to guide them when necessary. However, the coronavirus outbreak has caused thousands of schools to close leaving many children without the regular resources they need to learn.

Being able to read independently is important for children because it helps encourage independent learning as well. Knowing how to help a child to learn how to read independently can make a big difference in your child’s progress and learning process.

There is a strong association between independent reading and reading achievement as reading independently helps improve fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension. It is also closely related to motivation because kids that are able to read independently are motivated to read more and become interested in reading. 

At what age should a child read independently?

There are different stages for reading progress. Most children are able to read independently at ages 7-8 years old or 2nd-3rd grade. While this is the average age of reading independence, some children might still be struggling to read independently.

If your child is struggling to read independently, they could also end up struggling in other ways in school. Struggling to read might also mean they are struggling to understand their assignments. So, learning to read independently is an important skill your child must learn in order to be successful in school.

When they struggle to read independently, they might lose motivation and have little encouragement to practice. Luckily, there are some simple strategies you can use at home to help them learn how to read independently.

How can I encourage my child to read independently?

A key to helping your child learn to read independently is to build their motivation to practice at home. These are some easy and simple reading tips you can start using to help encourage them to read independently:

• Modeling independent reading – Kids learn best when they have a model to follow. They are likely to copy habits from you, so make sure you are modeling independent reading at home. Instead of sitting to watch television after dinner, curl up with a good book and set some time to read by yourself. This can encourage your child to do the same. 
• Schedule reading time – Reading independently takes practice just like any other skill. You can help make sure they get enough practice by scheduling reading time every day. Scheduling a set time for the whole family to read together independently shows that reading is a priority. 
• Talk about what they are reading – When you ask your child about what they are reading, they can see that you are actually interested and excited about what they are reading and learning. This can also help you see how their reading comprehension is developing. 
• Use books as a reward – Instead of using treats or toys as a reward, you can use books as a reward for your children. By making a big deal out of getting a new book, you show your children the value of books and encourage them to be excited to read. 
• Set reading goals – Reading goals helps encourage and motivate your child to read independently when they meet their reading goals. Make sure to document your child’s reading goals and accomplishments in a fun way such as through a reading chart or reading journal. 
• Use audiobooks – Everyone learns in different ways and some children might prefer auditory learning. Instead of relying on printed books, you can incorporate using audiobooks. This is also a great way for your child to hear a model of good reading as well. 
• Get a virtual reading tutor – If your child is still struggling to read independently, you might want to look into a reading tutor. However, tutoring can be expensive and is not available around the clock for your child. Utilizing a virtual reading tutor can be the key to getting your child to read independently.

While schools continue to be closed because of the coronavirus outbreak, your child is likely lacking the resources they need to help them with learning to read. Apps like Readability provide a virtual reading tutor that your child can access whenever they want. Readability has different features that use AI technology and speech recognition to help your child learn to read independently. Readability provides plenty of original stories at different reading levels. The app listens to your child as they read aloud and gives them instant feedback. It also provides you with a progress report so you can see how your child is doing.

Knowing how to help a child to learn how to read independently can make a world of difference for their academic success. Using some or all of the strategies mentioned can get them reading independently quickly.