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Five Easy Ways to Encourage Learning

As an involved parent, you want to make sure that your kids are learning all the time — not just when they’re in the classroom. With these five tips, you can empower your kids to become all-the-time learners who can’t wait to explore another book or discover a new nugget of knowledge.

1. Offer rewards.

Having kids who crave learning sounds great, but that doesn’t always come naturally to children. At first, your students may need some coaxing. Rewards to the rescue! Help your kids set a goal, and then provide an incentive to achieve it. When they read for a certain length of time or get through a set number of pages, you can reward them with a digital badge, a new book, or an encouraging note. They’ll develop a reading habit as they work toward their goals.

2. Use audiobooks.

Parents sometimes worry that audiobooks are “cheating.” For many kids, though, listening to audiobooks is just the thing to get them hooked on literacy. Plus, audiobooks have a variety of benefits for kids. They can help grow their vocabulary, improve their reading comprehension, and develop their imaginative skills.

3. Expect automatic feedback.

Quizzes and questions encourage kids to pay close attention and think critically as they read. Of course, as a busy parent, you don’t want to get bogged down with checking your children’s enrichment assignments. Make life easy on yourself by providing self-checking resources, such as digital books with built-in quizzes. Your kids will appreciate the immediate feedback, and you’ll appreciate not needing to be involved.

4. Make it digital.

Kids don’t want their weekend enrichment activities to feel like an extension of school. Leave pencils and paper for the classroom and use digital resources instead. Learning can come through many different formats, including child-safe video clips, digital news articles, online games, interactive maps, and more.

5. Provide freedom.

Kids appreciate independence. They may be more willing to engage in educational activities if they feel they have some control over the process. By providing access to a comprehensive online program like LightSail, you can give your kids the freedom to explore. At the same time, you can rest assured that their LightSail engagement is time well-spent.

In fact, LightSail for Home can be the perfect partner for all five of these tips. Our extensive libraries offer audiobooks, videos, encyclopedia articles, and more. The interactive quizzes provide immediate feedback for your young learners, and you can offer digital rewards to motivate your kids every step of the way.

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Posted on 9.Sep.21 in Reading at Home Tips

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How do I know what books are right for my child?

LightSail takes the guesswork out of choosing books for your child by tailoring each child’s library to their precise reading level.

By honing in on a child’s precise Lexile reading score, LightSail can match them with books that are at that “just-right” level to promote optimal reading progress.

And because LightSail contains such a wide-ranging array of content, there is always a vast selection of books for any topic or interest.

What ages/grades is LightSail for?

LightSail’s Premium and Standard subscriptions are designed for children in grades 3 through 12 (ages 8-18).

We also have a World Book Kids subscription for grades 1 through 2 (ages 5-7) and a World Book Early Learners subscription for PreK through K (ages 2-5).

Is LightSail different from an Amazon Kindle or other e-readers?

Unlike static e-readers, LightSail doesn’t just offer children books.

Every book and article in LightSail contains 6 layers of added features that let your child experience books.

By adapting to a child’s precise reading ability, offering them content that is at that “just-right” reading level to promote literacy growth, and providing a fully customizable, rewarding reading experience, LightSail unlocks the magic of reading in ways no physical book or static e-reader can.

What types of parental control do I have over my child’s activity and content?

In short, complete control.

LightSail contains an entire suite of parental control features that govern every aspect of the platform from video viewing, to chats, to what content can be seen and accessed.

Additionally, LightSail’s revolutionary ChildSafe Content Controls lets parents screen and block content according to dozens of nuanced subcategories based on maturity factors, family values, and religious topics.

How can I make reading fun for my child?

LightSail incorporates gamification features into every aspect of the platform, especially reading!

By integrating badges, goals and milestones, social sharing options, motivational messages, and the ability for parents to add customizable gift rewards, LightSail incentivizes reading, writing, and learning just like kids’ favorite games.

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