Home Reading Parent Letter & Bookmarks

Children learn to read better when they have support at home, but sometimes parents just don’t know how best to help their kids. Home reading can often be a battle, with parents unsure of how to help their child with reading at home (parents do not have teaching degrees, after all). I created these bookmarks to help my families avoid common parental mistakes that were often counter-productive or caused my students to stop enjoying reading at home.

Help families support students in learning to read - Educate your parents about how they should be listening to reading. This is a great handout for Back to School Night, Open House, Meet the Teacher, Parent Teacher Conferences, or for when you send home reading books. These are also helpful for parent volunteers so they know how to listen to children read.

Includes:

• 2 versions of my Pause, Prompt, Praise bookmarks
• Parent letter with detailed explanation of how they can support reading at home.

These bookmarks help create a love of reading by making home-reading a joyful, positive, worthwhile experience for students and families. I’ve been using them for the last 5 years and parents are always grateful for the advice.

The focus of these bookmarks is the Pause-Prompt-Praise process, which encourages listeners to help children independently use reading skills and strategies when trying to decode text.

How to Use:

Give out these “Pause-Prompt-Praise” bookmarks on Back-to-School night, or send them home early in the year, along with the included Parent Letter. I also often use them during Parent Teacher Conferences, because parents always ask how they can help their child with reading at home.

The bookmarks will help parents know exactly what they can say to their child when listening to their reading. You can even use these as a basis for a Parent Education night or a demonstration video about how to support reading at home. They’re great for parent volunteers, buddy readers, or Teaching Assistants too.

Your parents (and students) will appreciate the clear instructions and caring, positive tone of these “Help Me Learn to Read” bookmarks.

There are 2 versions of the bookmark. Just print on card-stock and send home with the included parent letter.

Thank you for supporting your students and their families as we grow great readers!

As a 23-year veteran International School IB PYP teacher, I focus on creating resources that are hands-on, open-ended, inquiry-based, easy for teachers, and engaging for kids!

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All rights reserved by author. For Single Classroom/Single Teacher Use Only.