Table of contents:
- The benefits of reading bedtime stories for children
- 1. Strengthen the relationship between children and parents
- 2. Increase the vocabulary of children
- 3. Introducing a new object shape
- 4. Helps cultivate emotions
- 5. Helping the speaking process
- 6. Train children's responses
- 7. Improve thinking skills
- Choice of bedtime fairy tales
Storytelling is a way to introduce reading habits to children from an early age. You don't have to worry if your little one doesn't understand what you are talking about. The reason is, a number of studies have proven that it is never too early to get used to reading fairy tales to your little one. Otherwise. regularly reading fairy tales before bedtime can actually help improve the growth and development of your child in the future.
The benefits of reading bedtime stories for children
Over time, the routine of telling children before bedtime has begun to be abandoned by many parents. In fact, reading fairy tales before going to bed offers a lot of benefits for your little one's growth.
Here are some reasons why reading bedtime stories is good for your child.
1. Strengthen the relationship between children and parents
Taking the time to read fairy tales before bed can be an effective way to spend time with your baby. In fact, this one activity can also help strengthen your bond with your little one. How come?
When you read your little one a fairy tale, an interactive communication process between parent and child will usually take place, even if your little one is still a baby. Without you knowing it, this creates warmth between the two parties.
The voice of the parents that their children listen to every day will also make them feel cared for and loved. Well, this happiness is what makes your relationship with your child even closer.
This fact is also supported by a study published in the Journal of Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics. In this study, it is known that building a habit of storytelling from an early age will strengthen your relationship with your little one.
2. Increase the vocabulary of children
A study shows that children who have been taught to read from infancy will have more vocabulary and numeracy skills that are better than other children who have not been taught to read since childhood
The study also showed that the more words your children hear when you tell the story, the better their language skills will be. As he gets older, your child will become more fluent in speaking and speaking. The reason is, his brain will continue to be stimulated to enrich different words and language styles.
3. Introducing a new object shape
In babies who are still babies, their eyes will focus more on seeing simple patterns in the story books that you show. Now with storytelling, you will indirectly introduce the form of objects, words, and various kinds of colors from an early age.
You do not need to buy a book collection of fairy tales that are thick and expensive. Instead, choose a book that is simple but contains many shapes of characters and is decorated with a variety of beautiful colors. That way, your little one will be more interested in glancing and enjoying it.
You can find various collections of fairy tales at the nearest bookstore or at the cheap book bazaar.
4. Helps cultivate emotions
When reading a fairy tale in front of your little one, the child will pay close attention to how you convey the emotions of each character (happy, angry, or scared) with different facial expressions and voices.
Without you knowing it, from there your child will learn how to vent feelings of anger, sadness, resentment, guilt, and even shame. Children who are able to vent their feelings tend to be more likely to process their emotions wisely.
5. Helping the speaking process
Reading can stimulate children's brain development. When you tell stories for fun they will receive information and begin to learn about sounds, sounds, words and sentences.
So, because of that, children who are accustomed to reading or listening to stories from an early age usually tend to be able to speak and convey their wishes more quickly. In other words, the habit of reading fairy tales really helps your child to communicate more easily with the environment.
6. Train children's responses
When you read fairy tales to babies, they are not able to respond to stimuli with clear words. However, when listening to you tell the story, your baby can respond through movement of his arms and legs. This response and stimulation will activate various nerve cells in the baby's brain more quickly.
So, while storytelling, you can also stimulate your baby's response. For example, by repeating each sentence. This can help your baby better record sentences and respond by mimicking your lip movements or facial expressions as you tell the story.
7. Improve thinking skills
Not only that, reading fairy tales before bed can also be used as a way to train his thinking skills. When a fairy tale is read, the child will learn to understand / memorize every word you convey.
The information that your child receives can also help develop the creative side of their brain because your little one will be provoked to have more and more curiosity. This will certainly make your child have a better insight into many things,
Choice of bedtime fairy tales
Implementing a new habit is not easy. Moreover, the business of reading fairy tales to children. If the fairy tale you tell isn't interesting, your child may get bored quickly.
For starters, you don't have to read too long a fairy tale. Start with short stories. So that children enjoy the storytelling session with you, make the storytelling atmosphere fun. Last but not least, make sure you choose a fairy tale that is full of the meaning of life and teaches good values. The reason is, what you often tell your children will be recorded in their memory.
Apart from fairy tales from western countries, Indonesia also has many interesting folk tales. This folklore has good life values and can be used as an example for everyday life.
For example, the story about Bawang Merah and Bawang Putih, which teaches children not to act arbitrarily with other people. You also tell the story of Timun Mas, a brave girl who managed to escape from an evil giant.
x