Navigating Autism: The Benefits of Reading to your Child

Reading can be very important for the development of children. However, despite often performing at average or above average levels of decoding language, children with autism sometimes struggle with reading comprehension as it involves skills like picking up on references and inferring.

Reading with your child from an early age is beneficial, and if your child has autism, the sooner you start reading the more familiar they will become with books, helping them to build their literacy skills. Reading is sometimes used as part of autism therapy. Sacramento families looking to build their child’s literacy should search of autism centers that offer reading resources.

Here are some of the benefits of reading with a child with autism:

1 – It helps them develop social skills

One of the most common challenges children with autism face is struggling to “read between the lines”. This can affect their ability to communicate and build social relationships. When reading, this can make it difficult to understand things like subtext and figurative language.

Reading regularly provides a great opportunity to develop these skills and apply them to other parts of their life. In addition to this, reading can help the child to understand the dynamics of different social interactions through stories, and this knowledge can then be applied practically.

2 – It can lead to improved language skills

Another benefit of regular reading is better language skills. Reading books is known to be one of the best ways to learn a language, especially books with a lot of rhyming repetition. Not only is it more engaging for children, but the repetition also helps them to expand their vocabulary.

As children with autism tend to struggle more with comprehension and understanding, this can hold them back when it comes to language development. But this can be improved with practice over time. To help the child become more interested in reading, visual aids, pictures and illustrations, colors, and even audio books, can be useful tools.

Another way to foster an interest in reading is to pick books that the child will find engaging. Many children with autism have specific, focused interests, so choosing books that connect to their existing passions can be a good place to start developing other skills.

3 – It boosts their cognitive development

Because children spend a lot of their time at home, this is where they learn basic social skills. Parents can help to reinforce some of the technique’s children learn in social skills therapy by speaking to the child’s therapist and developing their own ways to help, like games and visual aids.

Whether in an ABA therapy clinic Sacramento offers or at home, children are exposed to a variety of techniques to help with their cognitive development. Reading is another way to help children build these skills.

Reading can help with various aspects of cognitive development, including thinking skills, language skills, information processing, concentration and memory, and problem solving. Reading helps children to learn how to think and understand things, and this can be very valuable for children with autism.

Reading is part of autism therapy Sacramento therapists recommend, as it can give children access to knowledge from a wide range of topics. Studies show that children who read regularly are more likely to be exposed to science topics and mathematical concepts like numbers and shapes.

4 – It’s great for developing new interests

It’s common for children with autism to develop special interests in a limited number of subjects. Reading can be a valuable source of learning, along with other methods like videos and pictures or skill building at an ABA therapy clinic in Sacramento.

All children can benefit from reading to learn about their existing interests, or to discover new ones. This can mean developing their passions by finding information in books. Even if the child struggles with reading comprehension, they can still find books with pictures and guides, or books that contain more factual information. This can help them develop different skills.