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If you are reading this article and articles like it, you are taking the first and most important step for improving reading in your children: interest. Showing interest and reading to and with your children is the single most important thing you can do to help them become the best readers they can possibly be.

After that, there are certain activities you can do with your children to help them read better. These include prereading activities, fluency activities, vocabulary activities, and comprehension activities.

Prereading activities: Before your children are able to read, there are certain activities you can do with them to help them become aware of print, words, syllables, and units of language.

1. Read and reread their favorite stories. Talk about the front, bottom, top, and back of the book. Point out the pages and how to turn them, the pictures and their left-to-front order.

2. Have your children retell the story or draw a picture about the story.

3. Say three words and ask your children to tell you which word sounds different (Ex: my, tie, ball).

4. Say a sentence and ask your children to tap with a stick or mark with a marker every time you say a new word or, if you want to focus on syllables, every time you say a new syllable.

5. Using a puppet (you can make a cheap and easy one with paper or a sock), tell a short story to your children, but make obvious mistakes in pronunciation while you are telling it. Every time the "puppet" makes a mistake, it can turn its head in embarrassment, which cues the children to correct the puppet. (Ex: The puppet says, "I like my animal. He has a tail and he barks. He is a rog." Puppet turns away when he says "rog," and children shout out the correct answer, "dog."

Fluency Activities: After your children has had begun to recognize words and letters, it will help to then begin fluency activities, to help your children read easier, faster, and better.

1. If your children still have limited knowledge about words, work with them at saying the letters of the alphabet faster and faster. An optimal rate is approximately 47 letters per minute.

2. If your children have started to read, play a game in which they read as many words, phrases, or passages in 1 minute as they possibly can. Encourage them to go faster each time they play.

3. Read a story orally to your children as they follow along silently.

4. Locate some short stories and/or plays and do a reader's theater with your children. This is a short skit where each person has a part

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