Help Learning To Read By Post With Reading Chest

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Now that Erin has moved up from nursery to reception I’m more aware of things that we could be doing with her at home. Although we love to read at home, I wouldn’t say we have really done much in the way of helping Erin learn to read. Honestly, I’m not sure I would have known what books are right for her or what to pick. Luckily, Reading Chest came to the rescue and offered to let us try their silver subscription for 3 months.

Reading Chest offer a book rental service by post. The amount of books you get, and how many swaps you can make a month depend on the subscription level you choose. As we have the silver subscription this allowed us to have 4 books initially and 4 swaps each month. You are advised to return 3 books at a time so that you always have a book at home to read (and postage weights) so with this level of subscription, you could get 12 books a month.

Our initial package came with 4 books, a book bag, return envelope, bookmark and a reading chart with stickers. It’s a really nice set up and I loved that we got a bag included so that we could keep all of the books safe and together. I opted for the lowest reading level for Erin as she has only just started in Reception and I thought all 4 books were really well suited for her. Although she couldn’t ream them herself she could definitely pick out letters and we could work on forming words together.

Although we have set our account to just send us books from a certain reading level you can set up your own reading lists if you want to (amount depends on the subscription). This means that you can add favourite books if you want to or make sure that books that aren’t enjoyed quite as much stay off the list.

We have decided to keep each set of books for around a week at a time before sending them back. This way, we can hopefully read each one a couple of times with Erin and we can work on her remembering some of the words and letters from the story or subject. If you have really avid readers who might get through more books a month then the gold subscription offers unlimited swaps and this could come in really handy.

Not only did Erin love the books, and discovering what exciting titles she had been sent, but she really appreciate the little extras too. As soon as Erin saw the star chart she wanted to know what it was and when she could put the stickers on. There is space at the top of the star chart for your child to write their name too and included is a sheet of colourful star stickers. Erin also really liked that there was a bookmark and that she could write her name on that as well. The chart is a really fun way to encourage your child to aim to read more books as it will mean adding more stickers!

In the time that we have been trying Reading Chest we have really enjoyed the experience. It’s nice for me to not have to think about what books to get for Erin and she gets a nice surprise in the post when new books arrive. If you would like to win a 3 month bronze subscription then head over to our Instagram account to enter!

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