Story time tips for lighting up children's minds

Try to find books with large pictures and a simple phrase or sentence on each page. As well as reading the words, try naming and describing the pictures on each page, and ask your child what they can see and to point to the pictures you’re naming.

Try and encourage your wee one to think about the story by asking them open questions about it. (Open questions are questions that can’t just be answered by yes or no.) For example, to help boost their vocabulary, you could ask them about what they see, or ask them to describe one of the pictures. You could ask them what colour something is, or what an animal or object in the picture is, or what’s happening in a picture. Just remember not to overload them with too many questions and to give them time to reply.

Try talking about how the character is feeling, and asking your child to put themselves in their place. This helps them understand that other people have feelings too, which is important for making friends. You could ask them why they think a character behaved in a certain way, or how they think a character might be feeling. What would they do if they were in that situation?

Children often have lots of questions (from ‘Why is the sky blue?’ to ‘What if Sleeping Beauty needed a wee?’) Even if you can’t answer them, it’s great to encourage your little one to ask about the story you’re reading. ‘Because it’s magic’ is often a good answer!

If you’re reading a book in a series (like Meg and Mog or Oi Frog!), you could ask them what they remember about the other books. Have all the same characters returned? Is anyone new?

This is a great game to play with books with very busy pictures (like Richard Scarry’s books) or with lots of things happening. Look at the picture together and see if they can spot something that’s red, or blue, or, if they’re a little bit older, that starts with a ‘c’ or a ‘d’ sound.

Some books let you choose what’s going to happen – see if you can find any of Nick Sharratt’s You Choose books in your local library and you’ll have loads of fun making decisions together. Lift the flap books can encourage children at this age to interact and use words, signs or gestures to share what’s hidden.

When you’re reading a story together, try using hand gestures to act it out. For example, if you’re reading The Gruffalo, you could use your hands to act out his terrible tusks and terrible claws. This will help your child make a connection between the words on the page and the physical things they describe.

You can use stories you’ve read to build on their communications skills when you’re playing, for example by acting out a story you’ve read together with their toys. Will you change the ending? Or act out what happens next?