Pre Reading Activities For Children

Develop Strong Pre-Reading Skills Through Rhyming

Classic rhyming songs and others a great way to expose your child to rhyming, a very important pre-reading skill. You can either teach these songs to your child yourself and purchase them on a CD or DVD that you allow your child to listen to or watch. It is important to take some time to recite these rhymes with your child. Make it fun, make this an activity you do in the car, or at bedtime, allowing it to become a part of your daily routine. You can even sing along with the CD together.

More fun and creative ideas:

1. Have your child to come up with their own rhymes. You will be amazed at what they can come up with, the sillier and more fun the better! You will most likely need to discuss with your child words that rhyme and point out to them several times how to discover which words rhyme before they are able to come up with the rhymes on their own.
    
2. Play a game of “I Spy”. Begin by saying, “I spy with my little eye something that rhymes with sail,” and they could say, “mail”. You take turns with your child as they learn to rhyme everyday words.
    
3. Recite nursery rhymes with your child such as “Jack and Jill” and “The Old Woman Who Lived in a Shoe”. These are all good options for using rhymes with your child. You can even begin to leave out the rhyming word and have your child, fill in the blank. This helps them to develop their own skills of rhyming.

Rhyming allows your child to become more aware of the sounds in language. Through rhyming games your child will focus on sounds and learn to distinguish one from another. Even before learning to read having activities such as these as a part of a child’s routine will help them to obtain the skills that they will need when it does come time for them to learn to read.

Rhyming Books