Cultivating a Love for Reading Increases Academic Performance

One of the best ways to help your children become excellent students is to encourage them to read at a young age. Not only can reading together help a child and parent, or child and teacher form a strong bond, but it can also impact child brain development.

Research suggests that nearly 80% of a child’s brain develops in their first three years of life. Cultivating a fondness for books helps children to excel in the classroom and beyond, and the younger that a child learns to read and comprehend, the greater the impact it will have on their life.

Studies Affirm Reading’s Effect on Learning Skills

Your children do not have to be geniuses to do well in school or college. Instead, they just need to learn the enjoyment of books and develop their reading skills as soon as possible.

As little as 15 minutes a day helps greatly. Studies show that young children who learn to read develop the following cognitive abilities much sooner or more thoroughly than others:

• Concentration and focus
• Memory retention
• Literacy
• Critical thinking
• Imagination

Those five factors are very important in learning and developing cognitive abilities that will benefit students academically, and encourage them to become lifelong learners.

How Reading Boosts Learning Ability

Many students who spend more time playing video games tend to have shorter attention spans and a lesser ability to concentrate and focus. On the other hand, a child who develops the ability to read generally develops greater memory retention and critical thinking skills that enable them to grasp advanced concepts.

The ability to focus and concentrate makes it much easier to focus on school studies, effectively grasp the concepts, and apply them in the classroom as well as in life. It also helps to develop imagination and the ability to think outside of the proverbial box.

In addition to improving cognitive ability, reading can also help children learn about different cultures, people, and places, which can cultivate a sense of empathy. Empathy usually begins with a sense of understanding or relating to what someone else is going through, and reading can help bridge the gap between children and cultures and situations they are otherwise unfamiliar with.

Fostering a Child’s Fondness for Books

Whether you’re an educator or a parent, you can help your children and students to develop their reading skills and fondness for books starting well before they have the ability to read on their own. Many children’s books provide artful illustrations and simple text that helps to keep them engaged and wanting to turn that page to find out what happens next. The hidden benefit is that they can also begin to learn simple words as they enjoy the illustrations and the quality time together.

Virtually anything that encourages children to take a natural interest in books helps them to develop reading skills and perform better in school. Coloring books for the very young and books with lots of pictures that discuss topics that your children are interested in will help them to stay engaged in the learning process, and want to open books and read them for pleasure.

For example, if you have a child or student who loves animals, books that have photos of puppies, kittens, and older dogs and cats can help them to learn about pets while increasing their reading abilities and comprehension.

Cultivating a love for reading helps children to cultivate a love for learning, and people who become lifelong learners will reap rewards over and over again throughout their lifetimes. After all, learning is the one of the cornerstones of academic, professional, and personal success.