‘When will my child start reading on his own?’ If you are a parent of a 5 or 6-year old, then this is possibly your top-of-the-mind question.

‘My daughter reads small words like cat and bat but if I give her a storybook, she is just not interested!’ Sounds familiar?

Don’t skip the sentences

If your child is able to read words, don’t expect him or her to leap into the next storybook filled with a lot of text. Take them on to reading short sentences.

Better still, create Extended Sentences.

Here’s an example:

• The dog runs.
• The dog runs and plays.
• The dog runs and plays in the mud.
• The dog runs and plays in the mud all day.

Notice how the sentence extends by adding one new word each time. Its easy and effective. It looks like a paragraph, but it’s really just a set of simple words, repeated often.

Do this with your child for a week, and see the difference.

This is a neat trick to quickly springboard your child to reading storybooks with longer sentences and paragraphs. Believe me, it works.