Libraries and Emergent Literacy

Pediatric Partners

Introduction

History

Brain Research

Pediatric Partners

Parent Education

Advocacy

Conclusion

Site Map

References

William Caskey

LIBR 500: Foundations of Information Technology

School of Library, Archival, and Information Science

University of British Columbia

Last updated April 15, 2005

Feeding and Reading

Now that there's no doubt about how language interaction between babies and their caregivers is crucial for brain growth, pediatricians can persuade parents at every well-child visit to read to their babies. And parents listen because doctors are authority figures. Libraries have found that they can partner up with area health clinics and health-care providers in making books part of every pediatric visit.

Books for Babies

Since the mid 1990s Books for Babies in Kalamazoo County, Michigan, has provided a book to each child born in the county along with an invitation to obtain a library card in the child's name. The program is one facet of Kalamazoo Public Library's Ready to Read early childhood literacy initiative. In September 2005, a Books for Babies program will begin across the province of British Columbia.

Since 1989, Reach Out and Read has provided start-up funding for pediatric clinics in the United States to obtain a stock of books to be distributed to parents along with good advice about how to enjoy them with kids. "Reach Out and Read makes literacy promotion a standard part of pediatric primary care, so that children grow up with books and a love of reading." 8

KPL's Rx:Reading, another facet of Kalamazoo Public Library's Ready to Read program, has expanded the concept of a prescription to read to your baby coming from pediatricians only. Other professionals spreading the message are social workers, nutritionists, and speech/language pathologists. .

It Really Works

Research on the effectiveness of adding a prescription to read to your baby shows that the programs are effective:

A study of 122 families enrolled at one of two inner-city general pediatric clinics found that those families in an intervention group exposed to an established Reach Out and Read program reported a higher frequency of reading than the control group. Children of families receiving the intervention also had statistically significantly higher receptive and expressive language scores. The greater the exposure to the intervention, the greater the gains in language scores.

Another study evaluated the efforts of Reach Out and Read on children attending the original comparison clinic, two years after ROR was implemented there. The study compared a statistically matched set of 65 families from both the pre- and postROR groups. Again, the children in the intervention group were read to more frequently and had higher receptive and expressive language scores. 9

Collection Development

Children's Services Librarians can select age apporpriate books for pediatric clinics. For instance, board or cloth books for the very youngest with contrasting colors and pictures of other babies. Books with more text and more complex narratives are appropriate for the older siblilngs. In some cases, such as with Ready to Read in Kalamazoo, the library based program provides fund-raising and administrative support to pediatric clinics social service agencies that they're partnered with.