Turn on the captions

For little ones, sharing books is the best and easiest way to learn words and their meaning, but there are many other ways you can discover words together. 

Have you ever thought to turn the captions on while your child is watching their favourite show? It’s a great way to expose your child to language and feel a little better about a small dose of screen time. 

Captions (or subtitles) give your child the opportunity to see the words as they are spoken. Even though they may not be able to recognise the words, being exposed to them early on supports their alphabet knowledge and builds their motivation to see and understand things in print. 

Turning on the captions helps your child make a connection between the words they are hearing and the words they see on the screen. It’s also a great way to learn new words they may not have heard before. Captions can also help your child learn to use letters and sounds to correctly pronounce words. 

There are many ways you can encourage literacy at home. Modelling reading is a powerful tool to motivate your child to read or share a book with you. As they get older, reading will become a part of their daily lives. To nurture this motivation, make it easy for your children to access books where they spend their time – in the bedroom, in the car, in the living room, even the kitchen.  

Remember, it's never too early to start your child on their literacy journey, and there’s always a good place for a book!