Reading Rhymns to my son

I strongly believe that children should kick start their reading habits early.
It helps to strengthen their language skills and they can better express themselves when they are older.

I didn't have that when I was younger. In fact, my Chinese had always been my stronger language. I even competed in Chinese story telling competitions from primary 1 to secondary school. That's because my parents communicated to me in mandarin and my mum often read Chinese story books to me.

I didn't enjoy reading english books. When I picked up them up, I would flip through the pictures and doze off after reading a few pages. Why??? Because my English was SO WEAK THAT I COULDN"T UNDERSTAND!

I hated comprehension passages because I couldn't understand what the passage was about even after reading it for 3-4 times. I even fell asleep during an english examination. YES!!! I was THAT BAD!!!!

 I can't remember which year, but I had a good English teacher. She asked me to read rhymes and short stories because she knew that my had short attention span when I read. She also asked me to keep a diary and make sure I write at least a few sentences a day. :))

I failed my English during my O'Level and got a D7. I passed my English only the year after when I took the paper again. I worked REALLY HARD for that.

Until now, my English is no where near to good. My vocabulary is still weak. I make lots of grammatical mistakes.
So I know very well the need to start young. It's not about sending your child to language courses and tuitions. There are 1001 types of courses out there promising you good results for a 2-3 year old toddler (duhhhh...) but I still think your child prefers you to read to him/her.

I started reading rhymns to my son recently. Different from the picture books I read to him while showing him the pictures, I read the rhymns while he play his toys. I believe this will help improve his listening skills. Shall share with you when I spot some nice ones! :)

Cheers,
Kaye