At the recent event in Concord, NC, children at Save the Children Head Start Cabarrus Academy received the bright red bags filled with diverse, award-winning books to take home and read together with their family. Each week, the students will receive new books to rotate in the home,  fostering a love of reading and bonding time with their families. As Dr. Olivia Givens, Senior Program Director for Save the Children Head Start in NC, shared, “We know that when children read together as a family, they are more likely to succeed in kindergarten and life.”

A similar launch event took place in Farmington, NM, where the community gathered at Apache Elementary School to kick off the program. Both communities are part of Raising a Reader’s broader mission to serve children across the US, supporting early learning and family engagement in partnership with local organizations and partners.

This collaboration demonstrates the power of radical collaboration in helping young children develop critical literacy skills and fostering meaningful family connections. As Raising a Reader celebrates its 25th anniversary, the launch of partnerships like these in Farmington and Concord demonstrates our continued dedication to supporting early learning and family engagement across the country. Through this collaboration, we’re ensuring that children in rural communities have the tools they need for success in school and life.

Read more about the program launch in Concord, NC.

Caption: Worldreader’s BookSmart app and the Raising a Reader organization are helping to virtually fill the shelves of little libraries in “Kinder Ready” pediatric clinics.

By Kristen Walter, Director of US Programs, Worldreader

Every clinic waiting room has one: the frazzled adult with several kids in tow, carrying an overstuffed bag filled with Kleenex, crayons, and cracker crumbs. Maybe you’ve even been that adult who hands the kids a screen in a last-ditch attempt to keep them from ransacking the stack of intake forms or emptying the hand sanitizer bottle on the rug. 

Don’t worry. Help is on the way. 

Worldreader has partnered with the Raising a Reader organization and several pediatric clinics in the Bay Area of California, leveraging technology to connect waiting families with high-quality books. This is accomplished with Worldreader’s BookSmart app, providing young readers ages 3 through 12 with free and instant access to hundreds of digital books in multiple languages.

The intent of the partnership goes far beyond simply providing families with a diversion. Raising a Reader’s Senior Vice President of Programs and Partnerships, Michelle Siosin Hyman, said her organization is founded with a belief in strengthening families. “We believe that early literacy is the cornerstone in equity for all,” she said. “We want reading to be in places like housing agencies, medical clinics and home visiting programs. We want families to have access to diverse books in all of the spaces and places where they are.” 

Dr. Reshma Thadani agrees. She is part of a number of pediatricians promoting “Kinder Ready” clinics that focus on school readiness, especially for families less connected to early childhood education programs. Kinder Ready clinics engage parents and guardians as their child’s first teacher, providing learning materials in friendly clinic environments and embedding a school readiness narrative into clinical guidance.

“When I learned about BookSmart, I thought, ‘This is really a perfect solution for us. This is a way that we can promote reading with people who are already on an electronic device.’” 

Why? Summer reading is critical for students to defeat summer learning loss and retain knowledge and skills learned in the previous school year and help prepare them for the upcoming school year. Students who don’t read are at risk of falling behind their classmates. Parents and teachers can avoid this by making sure kids take time to read throughout the summer. 

And, we have a few ideas and tools for you! 

READCamp, led by “Head Coach” Malcolm Mitchell, is fun and active way to support children and families during the summer. The free virtual summer reading training camp for kids in ages/grades PreK-12. Kids will stay in great reading shape over the summer by participating in training, drills and lots of reading practice.  

READCamp kicks off Memorial Day and runs through Labor Day, 2023. Registration is open now.

Raising a Reader’s Super Summer Learning Adventures (SSLA) program offers a fun way to support children at home during the summer by developing and reinforcing early learning skills through investigation, critical thinking, imagination, and meaningful, fun family experiences.  

How does it work? Families receive books, including Malcolm Mitchell’s book My Favorite Book in the Whole Wide World. Each book offers read alouds in English and Spanish, fun downloadable activities, and virtual field trips! SSLA reinforces the school – family partnership in supporting all children. 

Learn more about SSLA today! 

• Highlights is a global media brand dedicated to helping children become curious, creative, caring and confident.
• Read with Malcolm (Share the Magic Foundation), founded by Super Bowl Champion Malcolm Mitchell, is dedicated to promoting the benefits of reading and book ownership, especially among striving and below grade-level readers who are at risk of academic failure.

• Worldreader works globally with partners to support vulnerable and underserved communities with digital reading solutions that help improve learning outcomes, workforce readiness, and gender equity.

Learn more about RAR’s Super Summer Learning Adventures Program today!

We’re celebrating our partnership with Masons of California. With their generous longtime support of nearly $4M since 2011, RAR has been able to increase the resources we bring to our Affiliates. To date they have funded more than 800 classrooms. We are closing in on our goal of reaching 1,000 Masons of California classrooms!  

Here are some recent highlights from our partnership:  

·       Bahia Vista Elementary in the San Rafael Unified School District launched 4 new first grade classrooms with Masons of California support this year.  

·       New Haven Unified School District launched 2 Mandarin Dual-Immersion Kindergarten classrooms this year. 

Thank you to the Masons of California for their transformative partnership and enduring commitment to engaging families in early childhood.

Last year, RAR was gifted kidappolis, a bilingual app designed for caregivers to support early learning in literacy, math, and science and we’re busy learning how to integrate our home library programs with the kidappolis app through a test pilot in the Bay Area.  

We are grateful to partners like Eden Housing for caring so deeply about their families and providing multiple opportunities for families to learn together.  

The input from our Parent Design Session recently conducted with Eden Housing families is critical to creating Raising a Reader’s hybrid solution to family engagement and early literacy. 

This Giving Tuesday, Raising a Reader wants to give sincere thanks to our network of Affiliates, Partners, and supporters across the nation who help make our work possible.
We love working closely with you to help bring diverse stories to the children and families in your communities who delight in seeing their lives and experiences reflected in the many books that they share together at home thanks to you and Raising a Reader.

With gratitude and appreciation from all of us at Raising a Reader to you!

Here is just one of the over 3,000 carefully curated titles in our diverse book collection with selections in 13 languages!

With appreciation,

Your friends at Raising a Reader

SSLA develops and reinforces early learning skills through easy-to-use tools and resources that support learning recovery and school readiness through meaningful family experiences.

At RAR, we believe in collaborating radically to provide impactful resources and programming and have teamed up with mission-aligned organizations to bring you our Super Summer Learning Adventures program. Let’s take a closer look at our Super Summer partners:

• Highlights is a global media brand dedicated to helping children become curious, creative, caring and confident.
• Kide Science is based on years of academic research in the University of Helsinki. The Kide Science platform offers the most engaging model to break the mold and give teachers the confidence to teach inquiry-based lessons with play and stories to children aged 3-8.

• ParentCorps’ mission is to transform the pre-K experience in historically disinvested neighborhoods by helping schools partner with families to build a future where all children thrive.
• Read with Malcolm (Share the Magic Foundation), founded by Super Bowl Champion Malcolm Mitchell, is dedicated to promoting the benefits of reading and book ownership, especially among striving and below grade-level readers who are at risk of academic failure.
• Worldreader works globally with partners to support vulnerable and underserved communities with digital reading solutions that help improve learning outcomes, workforce readiness, and gender equity.

Learn more about RAR’s Super Summer Learning Adventures Program today!

Reading over summer vacation may not be a priority for children, but parents and teachers should make it one.  

A New Year’s Reunion is appropriate for children of all ages.

Summary:

A New Year’s Reunion from author Yu Li Qiong and illustrator Zhu Cheng Liang is an endearing story of a Chinese family celebrating the New Year with a special reunion. Little Maomao’s father is a migrant worker, his job is so far away that he only comes home once a year, for the new year celebration. Maomao hasn’t seen her father since last year and is excited and nervous to have him home again. They quickly form a rekindled bond and enjoy their time together. But all too soon it is time for her father to go back to work. The timeless words and beautiful illustrations are sure to resonate with every child who misses relatives when they are away–and shows how a family’s love is strong enough to endure over time and distance.

Practice this Comprehension Strategy-Making Connections:

As you read A New Year’s Reunion ask your child questions about their own experiences. Do you celebrate Chinese New Year? Does your family have any special New Year’s traditions? Do you have a family member that travels for work? If so, how does your child feel when that family member leaves and returns? Books can be mirrors where your child can see their own life reflected and they can be windows giving your child a glimpse into someone else’s life and experiences. By relating to the text in this way, your child will be more engaged in the entire book sharing experience.

Do this with your child:

After you read A New Year’s Reunion you and your child may want to join in the celebrations. You can enjoy a traditional Chinese meal like the one prepared in the story and make decorations for the event. Here’s a guide to make Chinese lanterns. Have fun!

If you’re interested in sharing A New Year’s Reunion with your child you can find it from Candlewick Press here. You can like them on Facebook and follow them on Twitter for more inspiration.

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