Reading together 2 min read

Ten Minutes of Reading Together

A short, unhurried reading time most evenings does more than a long one now and then.

Pick a time that already exists in your evening — after dinner, before the lights go off — and give it to a book. Ten minutes is plenty.

Let your child hold the book and turn the pages, even if they turn two at once. Point at the picture and say what you see. If they want the same story for the eleventh night running, read it again; the repetition is doing something useful.

A book in your mother tongue counts just as much as one in English. So does a story you make up about the day you both had.

If your child is not interested tonight, stop and try tomorrow. Reading together should feel like sitting close, not like a task to be finished.

Try this today

Let your child choose which book, even if it is the same one as last night.
Ask one question about the picture instead of reading every word.
Tell one story from your own childhood, with no book at all.

Every child grows at their own pace. Nothing here is a checklist, a test or a way to measure your child against anybody else.