How To Make Your Kid’s Book Learnin’ Geniuses
We all want our kids to be little geniuses.
The problem?
There is simply too much conflicting information surrounding the topic.
Thus, we aren’t going to focus on giving you an overview of every possible technique for making little geniuses.
Instead, we are going to focus on one thing that has been proven to be beneficial to your children’s cognitive growth: Story Time.
More importantly, we will give you our adaptation of the method developed by The Stony Brook Reading and Language Project to ensure your readings have the maximum cognitive benefits.
But we are gonna change it up to make it less, Uhmmm, science-y. If you want to read about their method, click here.
Otherwise, read along for our SparkNotes.
The Ask And Repeat Method
“And then Moe gave me a hyuuuuuuuuge beer…”
Not all stories are created equal.
While reading to your kid is always good, to get the most benefit from storytime, we would like to introduce you to a technique that encourages your kids to become the storyteller themselves.
This is not a listening exercise, but a conversation!
Here are the steps. Don’t worry, an example ahead!
Also, yes, we know we don’t have a catchy acronym. Just remember to Ask and Repeat, and treat these steps as a loose guideline.
Ask
Ask your child a question about the story.
Review
Review your child’s response.
This will shape your response in the next section.
Add To
Here, ask your child another questions about the story.
Repeat
Have your child repeat your ‘add’.
An Example of Ask And Repeat!
You’re reading a book about cats and their varied emotional states.
In the book, there is a photo of a cat looking incredibly sad.
Ask (a question):
You: What’s in this photo?
Kid: “A cat”
Size Up:
You: Yes, my kid is correct! Wow, we’ve got a genius on our hands.
Add To:
“Yes, you identified it’s a cat! What do you notice about that cat?”. They might say “it looks sad” or “it’s white”.
Repeat:
“Can you say that’s a sad, white cat?”
“It’s a sad, white cat, dad!”
The Benefits Of Ask and Repeat Reading
Do not fear the large-headed child(he is learning)
The most obvious: by making reading an interactive experience, your kid will have more fun, and be more engaged.
While your kid is engaged, they are learning two important things: Vocab, and how to interact with a story.
The vocab aspect is obvious: as they expand their answer or you might need to introduce new words.
The other aspect is less obvious: by having a conversation with them about the book, you are teaching them how to think critically about a book.
Look. This isn’t some hair-brained idea we invented.
This is hard science that we’ve adapted to make it easier to understand and implement.
So.
Make Story Time
More Fun
More Beneficial to their little noggins.
Go make a little Jimmy Neutron!
