Reading Aloud With Character Voices

A book with at least 2-3 characters who have dialogue (fairy tales and animal stories work great)

Choose a book with multiple speaking characters.

Assign voices: "Bear is deep and rumbly. Mouse is tiny and squeaky."

Practice each voice. Make it silly.

Start reading. Switch voices at each character's dialogue.

Point to text when your child's character speaks. Let them read in voice.

Add expression: trembling for scared, fast for excited.

Switch roles halfway through or next reading.

Discuss: "Did voices make it more fun? Which character was your favorite?"

Reading with expression (called prosody) is one of the key components of reading fluency. Monotone reading suggests a child is using all their brain power on decoding, leaving nothing for comprehension. Expressive reading shows comprehension is happening in real time.

Character voices make children PAY ATTENTION to quotation marks. They need to know when a character is speaking — and that awareness of dialogue punctuation improves reading comprehension significantly.

This is a great way to make re-reading enjoyable. Children need to reread books for fluency practice, but rereading feels boring. New voice assignments make the same book fresh.

For emerging readers, you read the narration and they read only the character lines. This way they practice a manageable amount of text while staying fully engaged.

Record yourselves reading in voices and play it back. Kids love hearing their dramatic performances.