Read Aloud: There’s A Monkey in My Backpack!
With school starting soon I thought it would be very fitting to do a read aloud. The message in the book is also a good one for kids to know.
With school starting soon, or maybe it already started, I thought it would be fun to have some read alouds. As a former first grade teacher I read aloud to my students every day. Every. Single. Day. It was one of my favorite things to do while teaching.
I read to and with my kids most days, less now that there are so many of them…. Oops! Do as I say and not as I do.
But there is something different about doing a read aloud for education purposes. Let’s dive right in. 😊
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What is a Read Aloud?
A read aloud is simply reading a book out loud. My experience is mostly with picture books. That was mostly because:
- I love picture books
- I worked with little kids (ages 6-7), and they seemed to do better with books with pictures
- My kids are little. Eddy is the one who reads chapter books with our kids.
Why Should I Read with My Kids?
You should read with your children for SOOOOO many reasons! I’ll give you just a few:
- Bonding time
- Great modeling for prereaders (and all readers)
- Modeling what a good reader does
- Increased vocabulary – I can’t remember the stats but children who get read to daily vs children who do not will have hundreds, if not thousands, more vocal words known
- Modeling fluency (rate, accuracy, expression)
- Concepts of print (book holding, turning pages, direction we read, etc.)
- It’s fun!
- Modeling and introduce a love of reading
Did I convince you?? I sure hope so. Reading is such an important time to spend with your little and big ones.
What Should I Do During a Read Aloud?
This one can be a bit more complicated. I’ll give you the basics. 😊
You can just read the book and enjoy your time reading with your child(ren). Easy peasy.
If you want to ask any questions you can start with a few basic ones. What was your favorite part? Why did you like that part? Tell me about the characters. What happened in this book?
If you want to go a bit deeper, you can stop to ask questions while you are reading. You can go so far as to pre-read the book to have questions already to ask. That’s completely not necessary though. You can make them up on the fly.
I suggest you ask questions that are not yes and no answers. You want to get your child talking about the book, not just saying yes or no.
And please take the time to stop and talk when your child has questions. This is the hardest for me. When we do read at bedtime, I’m so ready for them to BE IN BED. I kind of want to just plow through the books. This tells me I need to start earlier or read less books.
Read Aloud!
Okay, let’s get to the book part of this post. I’m super excited to share this new book with you all. It’s called, There’s A Monkey in My Backpack! I received a copy of this book a few years ago (then it got lost and I finally found it).
What I love about this book is the message it is telling. The little girl, Anna, has some learning difficulties, which I relate to because I was (and am) a girl with reading difficulties. She has a monkey in her backpack that makes it hard for her along the way.
Again, I can totally relate to that! Growing up with ADHD and reading difficulties I had to figure out different ways to get things done. And guess what?! Sometimes IT IS still that way.
I get emotional when I read this book because it hits so close to home. And it hits home to one of my kiddos that seems to be going through some of the same things. I will FOR SURE be reading and talking about this book with my kiddos before school starts.
As you are listening along while I read this book, please feel free to pause and talk whenever you feel is best for you and your child(ren).
Thanks for reading along with me as I do one of my favorite teaching things – a read aloud. 🙂
Funny thing! I really thought everything was backwards when I was doing the video, it’s totally not. Haha, ops! Just ignore me when I say that the words are backwards in the video. 😆 And can we get a slow clap for that screenshot below??!?! Bahaha!
Please share if this book hits home and what questions you plan to ask your child(ren). Thanks!
Xxx, Steph
Want to get more info about the book and author? Links below. 🙂
Don Winn’s email – don.winn@gmail.com
