Maury County Library challenges families to read 1,000 books
To read 1,000 books before Kindergarten: That is the goal for families with young children in southern Middle Tennessee.
The 1,000 Books Before Kindergarten program is a nationwide challenge that encourages parents and caregivers to regularly read aloud to their young children.
The effort that is being supported locally by the Maury County Library, which offers a new platform for parents and guardians to achieve the goal.
"Spending just 20 minutes a day reading a book to a child under 5 increases their vocabulary, phonetic abilities, phonemic awareness, and their comprehension," said Zac Fox, the director of the county's library system. "Our goal with 1,000 Books Before Kindergarten is two-fold: improving literacy skills and turning children into life-long readers."
The program is a local passion project of Janice Cook, an educator with more than 30 years of experience in the classroom and a Master's degree in training young readers.
“It is so important,” Cook said. “You are influencing your child’s academic future by reading to them. They need these skills to be successful. The most important measure of school success is being read to at home.”
A pathway to success
Cook said daily story times between a parent and a young child is key to establishing a healthy relationship with reading.
“Parents are children and babies’ first teachers, and it is important to share the importance of reading before they ever get to school,” Cook said. “This is a key factor in a child’s brain development. The most important measure of school success is being read to at home. “
Research shows that one of the most reliable predictors of a student's school success is being read to during early childhood.
Reading to children from an early age can help close the vocabulary gap and prepare children to enter kindergarten with the skills they need to succeed.
Most importantly, sharing books with children promotes a lifelong love of books and reading, the program communicates.
"The vocabulary a child possesses by age three is an accurate indicator of their third-grade reading achievement," Fox said. "Couple this with standardized testing data in the state of Tennessee from 2018 that shows only 34% of third-grade students are proficient in reading, and it is easy to see the impact that early reading intervention has on student success."
One page at a time
By reading one book a night, the initiative states families can reach the 1,000-book goal in three years, instilling essential early literacy skills in young boys and girls.
And to relief of participating parents, yes, you can reread books.
“Little kids like to see the same book read to them over and over again,” Cook said. “Hold the child, and associate reading as a positive experience.”
The platform, hosted by the county library, offers parents a means to record each book read and offers a services of recommended titles available at the local library.
Story times go digital during pandemic
Amid the coronavirus pandemic, the public library encourages the participation of young readers from a distance. Each day, the library posts a video of a staff member reading one of their favorite children's books.
“It is great to be able to promote literacy, while people can’t come into the building,” Tyler Staggs who recently read “Tea with Oliver,” to the online audience.
The daily tradition has continued since the initial days of the pandemic.
“It is great that we have that option," Staggs said. "We are doing what we can.”
The initiative also encourages young participants to create their own stories, set goals and achieve them.
"I am excited about it," Cook said. "I think it it will be a wonderful program. We would like this to eventually become an outreach initiative and share to parents and groups the improve of early literacy skills.”
The library continues to offer books to the public through curbside service.
To register for the program through the Maury County Library, visit http://mcpl.readsquared.com/.
Mike Christen is the multimedia editor for The Daily Herald. Reach him at firstname.lastname@example.org and find him on Twitter at @MikeChristenCDH.