The Advantages of Reading to Your Fetus

You may be expecting, but you do not have to wait for your due date to start caring for your baby. Nurturing begins in the womb. While your body nourishes the fetus by providing for its physical demands, consider future emotional and social needs by reading to the child now. Reading aloud will not necessarily turn your baby into a genius, yet this bonding activity will give you and your family some advantages.

Sound Therapy

• Research shows that external stimuli is one of the various factors that influence fetal growth and development. The ear is one of the earliest organs to develop and is the only contact that the fetus has with the outside world. The fetus starts hearing at around 25 weeks old. Since the womb is its immediate environment, it hears not only the sound of the mother's bodily processes like her heartbeat but also the mother's voice. If you sing, talk and read aloud frequently, you can get the baby in utero well acquainted with your voice. Parents and doctors alike have observed that newborn babies often tune in more to the sound or rhythms that they might have heard a lot. Establishing a sense of the familiar will ease the baby's transition from your womb into the world. The sound of your voice carries that much comfort.

Early Literacy

• Although there is no guarantee that the very act of reading to your fetus will give him a competitive advantage over his classmates in kindergarten, it can pave the way to academic success. Some theories have suggested that language patterns that babies hear in utero can stimulate their intellectual abilities. Plus, collecting books to read to your baby in utero will result in a library of books that you can read to the baby once he's born.

Adjustment for the Family

• Parenting is not really an inborn talent, but rather a skill that you develop over time. By reading and talking to the life in your womb, you are acknowledging it as the little boy or girl that it will become. Fathers and siblings who read aloud to their unborn babies may find that this activity bridges the distance between themselves and the unborn child. Thus, when you and your loved ones take the act of reading as a means to bond with the child that you are expecting, everyone can prepare a nurturing environment for the newest member of the family.