From The Bookshelf...Point-And-Say Books

Reading doesn’t have to be a passive activity for your little one. Although I love the peaceful act of reading to our little boy each evening while he snuggles under my arm with his nighttime bottle of milk before bed (can I please press pause?!), it’s also really fun to use reading in a more active way.

Rod Campbell’s name is on the spine of many books in our children’s nursery and two favourites are his point-and-say books, Let’s Name! and Who’s That? published by Macmillan. They’re a simple, but incredibly effective, format: each board book contains 40 photographs of objects or animals with their name underneath.

At 17 months, our boy is probably still some way off naming the objects, but I believe the repetition will help him learn or, at least, become familiar with the process. We have lots of shape puzzles in the toy boxes, including two with animals (farm and safari), and Charlie loves playing with them. For the last month, I’ve been leaving Who’s That? next to the puzzles when I pack away his toys each day and, when he wants to play with the puzzles, I place the animals on their pictures (helpfully, each page is arranged so that the farm animals are on a double page spread and the safari ones another, so it works well).

I also match up items around the house with their picture in Let’s Name! so he can get used to asking for things he wants. It works really well with things that he often has like his cup or different fruit.