Reading Begins at Home, Second Edition: Preparing Children Before They Go to School

Reading Begins at Home is a book early childhood educators can recommend to parents. It is a straightforward account of proven ways in which parents can help their children with reading - before they go to school. Internationally acclaimed reading authorities Dorothy Butler and Marie Clay present research-based ideas for at home instruction in beginning reading concepts - instruction that anyone can use with little kids: parents, guardians, grandparents, or anyone else interested in nudging young readers toward a lifetime of literacy. The techniques are based on decades of exploring how young children come to read, on what they have to master to become readers, and on the relationship between a literate home and success in school. Butler and Clay describe one-to-one learning situations that occur in everyday life and describe ways they can be turned into opportunities for beginning reading instruction at home. They show how children can be gently introduced to the kind of instruction they will find at school as well as to concepts of print that will be key to success. Through immersion in high-quality books, direct instruction from adults, and simple encouragement, children can begin becoming readers. Parents need to know how to impleent these strategies at home. Reading Begins at Home can help them.