As the Christmas break approaches, you may be after some ideas for reading at home with your child/ren. Below is a list of engaging, fun and purposeful activities that you can enjoy with your child while reading at home.

Kindergarten to Year 3:

• Have magnetic letters available, possibly on a fridge in the kitchen, for your child to investigate the orientation of the new letters they are learning and to group letters into 3 letter consonant – vowel – consonant (CVC) words. Just have the letters your child has learnt out and add the final few letters as your child learns them at school. Foam letters could be used in the bathroom or outside with water play. Make letter-sounds and have your children write the letter or letters that match the sounds.
• Practise writing sounds and words in different media. You could try sand, salt, sugar, water icing, cornflour gloop or shaving foam. An example would be for you to give your child the sound ‘ay’ and they see if they can remember the alternative spellings ‘ai’ ‘ae’, ‘eigh’ and so on.
• Try physical games to remember words – your child could bounce a ball as they spell a word or read sounds you show them. Alternatively, try setting up some cups or buckets with sounds written on them; you say a sound and your child has to try and aim a ball or a crumpled piece of paper into the correct bucket or cup.
• Practise building sentences. This is a great way of practising ‘tricky’ words as well as sounds, and also of thinking about sentence structure. Simply write a selection of words on to small cards or pieces of paper and then use these to build a sentence – the sillier the better! Or challenge your child to make a sentence using as many words as they can containing the same sound.
• Using Lego: Add letters and digraphs to building bricks for your child to build and construct new words.
• Read and draw with your child. Simply write a three-letter noun on a piece of paper (e.g. pan) or a word containing a sound they know (e.g. bee, book, night) and challenge your child to read the word and draw a picture to match it.
• Take it in turns to make up new nonsense words using the sounds your child knows – the sillier the better!
• Play word games that connect sounds with syllables and words (for example, if the letters "p-e-n" spell pen, how do you spell hen?).
• Write letters on cards. Hold up the cards one at a time and have your children say the sounds (for example, the /d/ sound for the letter d).
• Write letters on pieces of paper and put them in a paper bag. Let your children reach into the bag and take out letters. Have them say the sounds that match the letters.
• Make letter-sounds and ask your children to draw the matching letters in sand or create them using playdough.
• Take egg cartons and put a paper letter in each slot until you have all the letters of the alphabet in order. Say letter-sounds and ask your children to pick out the letters that match those sounds or ‘sound talk’ a word e.g. c-a-t and ask your child to spell the word by pulling out the letters.
• Spend some time in your local library choosing and reading the books. When you’re reading a book together, look for sounds that your child recognises and encourage them to continue sounding out words and blending the sounds to read the word.

Years 4-6:

• Read aloud to your children. You will be teaching literacy concepts simply by sharing books. Encourage your children to listen, ponder, make comments, and ask questions.
• Find a fable, fairy tale, or other short story for your child to read. Then ask your child to illustrate a part of the story he or she likes best or describe a favourite character. Have the child dictate or write a few sentences that tell about this picture.
• As you make out your grocery shopping list, give your child a sheet of paper and read the items to him or her. If the child asks for spelling help, write the words correctly for him or her to copy or spell the words aloud as your child writes them.
• Show your child a recipe and go over it together. Ask your child to read the recipe to you as you work and tell the child that each step must be done in a special order. Let your child help mix the ingredients. Allow your child to write down other recipes from the cookbook that he or she would like to help make.
• Encourage your child to make a dictionary by putting together several sheets of paper for a booklet. Ask your child to write at the top of each page a new word he or she has recently learned. If the word can be shown in a picture, have him or her look through appropriate texts to find pictures that illustrate the words and paste them on the correct pages.
• Have your child write the meaning of each word and a sentence using each new word. Your child can then use some or all of these sentences as the basis for a creative story. Have your child read this story to you and other family members.
• Help your child start a journal. Say what it is and discuss topics that can be written about, such as making a new friend, an interesting school or home activity just completed, or how your child felt on the first day of school. Encourage your child to come up with other ideas. Keep a journal yourself and compare notes at the end of the week. You and your child each can read aloud parts of your journals that you want to share.
• Homemade bookmark: Provide your child with a piece of cardboard. On one side of the bookmark, have your child draw a picture of a scene from a book he or she has read. On the other side, ask your child to write the name of the book, its author, publisher, publication date, and a few sentences about the book.
• Ask your child to tell you about favourite TV characters using different kinds of words.
• As your child watches commercials on television, ask him or her to invent a product and write slogans or an ad for it.
• Prepare a monthly calendar with symbols such as a picture of the sun to represent an outdoor activity or a picture of a book to represent reading. Each time your child engages in a daily free time activity, encourage him or her to paste a symbol on the correct calendar date. This will give you an idea of how your child spends his or her free time. It also encourages a varied schedule.

Have a safe, blessed and merry Christmas with your families. We look forward to working with you and your children in the new year.