Get Parents Reading Aloud

Way back in 2011, the Eventing Standard started a campaign to “get parents reading aloud.

Back then it claimed the reading skills of one in five London parents were so poor they cannot read a bedtime story to their children.

Based on a National Literacy Trust report, some 370,000 parents lacked the confidence to read aloud,  significantly reducing their child’s chances of learning to read.

Educationalists continue to promote the vital role of parents in developing their children’s literacy skills. Nursery rhymes, bedtime stories and word games are the foundation of children’s reading and writing.

Parents, grandparents and carers can all contribute to building literacy skills at home to supplement formal learning.

The kicker some ten years later is this remains a live issue. The same campaigners continue to bang the drum for raising child literacy, just to get parents reading aloud. The issue became even more important with the disruption to schooling during the pandemic. Many parents stepped up, just as many did not, lacking the confidence in their own reading skills.

Now that schools are playing catch-up, literacy levels are back in the news, and the doom-sayers complain  standards are slipping. The fundamentals remain.

Follow the campaign to get London reading at www.standard.co.uk.