Jul 253 min read

12 children’s storybooks that help develop communication and language skills

Reading books with your little one is more than just a cosy bedtime routine! It offers a huge range of developmental benefits.

Through storytelling, your little one will expand their vocabulary, learn language skills, and nurture their creativity.

These can also introduce your child to a range of cultures, perspectives and experiences which promotes empathy and understanding of the world.

By immersing your little one in storytelling, you will lay a foundation for a lifelong love of learning and exploration!

Did you know… storybooks can help your little one in the development of all 7 areas of learning listed in the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS – click here to learn more).

And in the coming weeks, we will explore a variety of children’s books that do just that!

The areas we will explore are:

Communication and language.
Personal, social and emotional development.
Physical development.
Literacy.
Mathematics.
Understanding the world.
Expressive arts and design.

So, let’s dive straight into our first instalment: 12 children’s storybooks that help develop communication and language skills

How do children’s books help to develop communication and language skills?

The Department of Education explains: “Children’s speech develops through hundreds of hours of interactions with adults. Studies show that once babies begin to understand words their vocabulary increases quickly:

by age 1, children recognise about 50 words
by age 3, children recognise about 1,000 words
by age 5, children recognise about 10,000 words

Having a large vocabulary helps children learn more. Words allow them to make sense of the world around them.

Children’s language skills are connected to their overall development and can predict their educational success.

As speaking and listening develops, children build foundations for literacy, for making sense of visual and verbal signs and ultimately for reading and writing.

Communication and language is a EYFS prime area which means that it’s one of the important building blocks for all the other areas”.

So, we picked an easy but super important one this week! Children’s books are all about communication and language skills.

Reading books together can help your child learn new vocabulary, understand sentence structure and encourage them to discuss their thoughts and ideas.

Learning these things will also give them a huge confidence boost, helping them believe in themselves – that they are able to express their thoughts, ideas and feelings.

Picking a book your little one is particularly interested in (e.g. are they currently really into dinosaurs? Or unicorns?) will help them be more engaged in their learning and so pick up more words!

Afterwards, you can discuss what happened in the book and follow it up with related fun activities. This will help further their learning and has the potential to engage another area of learning!

For example, did you read a book about the zoo? Consider planning an animal-themed sensory tray activity (click here for inspiration) or even schedule a Zoo visit next weekend.

This will help them consolidate what they learnt and practice their language skills in context as well as engage the ‘understanding the world’ area of learning by learning about nature and wildlife!

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