Promoting Early Literacy a Little Differently

      I was recently looking at children's books for my classroom when I found If You Give A Mouse A Cookie by Laura Numeroff.  I remembered having this book read over and over to me as a young girl.  When I was growing up my mother was a stay at home mom, so she always had time to read books to my sister and I.  Now that I am studying early education I am beginning to understand why it is so important to introduce literature and to model literacy at such a young age.  Introducing literacy at an early age is so important because it prepares children to become readers and speakers.  Promoting early literacy also helps reading become enjoyable later on for children.  It made sense to me that my mother would read books to us because she had all the time in the world to read.  With the economy the way it is now does not give much leeway for a parent to stay home and spend the day with their child.  I began wondering how early literacy can be promoted if there is not always enough time to read books.  I decided to do a little bit of digging when I was approached by a parent who had this concern. 

          What I found completely changed my perspective about introducing early literacy.  Thinking about it now I cannot believe that I never realized there were so many ways to promote early literacy that do not always involve a book.  One of the tips that I found most interesting was to tell stories about and talk about family history.  It was explained on Get Ready To Read's website that this type of storytelling gets everyone involved in the tale.  Another tip that I found from Project Enlightenment was to encourage children to draw and write.  Drawing and writing allows children to explore the idea that their thoughts and ideas can be put onto paper and can be shared.

           Children are natural born storytellers and listeners.  They take so much more out of stories than anyone could ever imagine.  The stories that children hear often have a huge effect on a child's development.  A child's language development is always influenced by their environment and the world around them.  One of the major ways to help develop both early literacy skills and language skills is to involve children in conversations and modeling how their native language works along with the rules that the language follows.  This is a perfect way for a busy parent to promoting early literacy and the perfect place to involve children in conversation is the car.    The car ride gives parents and children time to tell stories and have conversations about the world around them.