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You are an early literacy advocate if you talk to other staff about the Every Child Ready to Read program and how you use it in storytime.
Contributed by Colleen Spahr, Westminster Public Library cspahr@cityofwestminster.us:
This is the script for the talk that I gave at a training for city employees, called Discover the Library. My talk was only 8 minutes, but it was enough to give the preschool staff the idea to ask us to present at the inservice training for their staff.
Discover the Library Training
Early Literacy Script
Prepared for city staff training; given with passion for the topic and with a conversational tone.
Participants have a copy of the brochure “Every Child Ready to Read @ your library,” or the brochure page with the six pre-reading skills and the definitions is scanned and projected onto a screen.
During our storytimes we read books and sing songs, but much more than that is going on. At Westminster Public Libraries we do literacy-based storytimes, using the Every Child Ready to Read @your library program. This program is based on research on how children learn to read. Librarians took the research results and applied it to library programming for young children.
This research tells us that there are 6 pre-reading skills that children can start learning from birth. We offer story times for children from birth through five years.
This is not about teaching children to read by three, but it is about getting them ready, so they can learn to read and write when they go to school. In our story times, we do activities that help children to develop these pre-reading skills; and we also educate parents about activities and books that develop these skills. These activities are everyday things that anyone can do. From the comments I have received, parents and caregivers like the value-added story times--story times are both fun and educational. Even staff likes understanding how these activities contribute to early literacy.
- Narrative Skills – Telling stories, Describing things and events: Of course, this skill is developed by reading books. The song, Itsy Bitsy Spider, is really a story. It’s also important to talk to children and describe to them what is going on, even before they can understand what you are saying and before they can respond verbally. When they are old enough to talk encourage them to talk about their activities, using What? or other open-ended questions. Also when reading books you can “read and talk,” asking the child questions about the book that are not answered with a simple yes or no. Narrative skills contribute to success with reading comprehension.
- Print Motivation – Loving books This is the most important pre-reading skill. Keep book sharing time fun. Activities to develop the pre-reading skills are not drills or lessons.
- Vocabulary – Learning new words and what they mean Most children’s books and songs have words that we don’t use in our everyday conversations. ( Read a couple of pages for a book of your choice. I used Fidgety Fish) Also, a study, that measured how often mothers verbally interacted with their children, found that children whose mothers interacted with them frequently throughout the day, had much larger vocabularies than those who didn’t interact as often. (A this point I shared a story from a mom who talked to her child while at the grocery store, wondering what other shoppers thought, as the child was too young to talk. Now her child has this amazing vocabulary.) A large vocabulary contributes to success with reading comprehension.
- Phonological Awareness – Being aware that words are made up of different sounds and playing with those sounds—rhyming. Many children’s books have rhyming text. And, of course, there are nursery rhymes and songs. ( Sing Willaby Wallaby…, including people from the audience.)
- Letter Knowledge – Knowing that letters are different from each other. Knowing their sounds. Recognizing letters everywhere. Young children can learn shapes to develop this skill, as letters are made up of shapes.
- Print Awareness – Using books and knowing how they work (Holding the book, opening it, reading from left to right. Knowing that the letters on the pages are the words that we are reading.) Having lots of books around and giving children the opportunity to handle them. Now and then pointing to the text as you read.
Phonological Awareness, Letter Knowledge, and Print Awareness contribute to success with decoding words.
We also network with other Colorado library staff who are committed to early literacy programming. Colorado Libraries for Early Literacy or CLEL has a mission to strengthen children's literacy through library services and community advocacy.
Do you have a great advocacy idea? E-mail it to the chair of our advocacy committee, Nancy Maday: nmaday@ppld.org