Children’s Book Week is a reading initiative recognized nationwide twice a year, in May and in November. It is the longest-running national literacy program and is marking its 106th anniversary this year. It is being celebrated at the Parsons Child and Literacy Center by the Schenectady County Public Library.
Kaela Wallman is the coordinator of youth services for Schenectady County Public Library. She says literacy programs like Children’s Book Week are important, especially in light of the Schenectady City School District’s performance in English Language Arts. According to the New York State Education Department, only 18% of third graders in the district scored "proficient" in ELA, compared to the statewide average of 43%.
“We know we have a literacy crisis in Schenectady — the test scores of third graders, their ELA test scores are much lower than the other local districts in Schenectady County, and so we know we need to do better with early literacy," she said. "We took advantage of Children’s Book Week to really focus on early literacy; put story times in places where we don’t normally have them, build children’s home libraries, gift them with new books and really celebrate and emphasize the importance of parents being engaged as their children’s first teachers.”
Throughout the week, volunteers and Wallman went around to different organizations and spaces like the WIC office, the Public Health Department and early literacy centers reading to children and distributing free books. On Friday, they were reading to infants, toddlers, and preschool-aged children at this center.
Serena Butch, one of the volunteers, read to a small class of children between 4 and 18 months old. Butch took her time, enunciating her lines, and stopping between every page to ask the children questions about what they had just heard. Although the class isn’t old enough to respond, Wallman says it is important parents read to their children from birth because it helps develop learning and reading skills as the kids grow up.
"We know that literacy starts at home, and what we know is that children who are at an economic disadvantage have far fewer books at home, less access to books," she said. "They’re read to less, they hear less literacy-rich materials, and that has long-term impact for their success in life, [and on] their graduation rate. So, we have to start early, and that’s the goal."
Jasmine Sager is an early Head Start teacher at the Parson’s Child and Literacy Center. She says programs and celebrations like these are important because it bolsters campaigns like the library’s STARS initiative to reach children outside of the classroom.
“I just really liked how they’re trying to reach kids in other areas besides school," she said. "They have bookshelves in doctor’s offices. They have bookshelves at other children’s programs. And I just think it’s really good to kind of reach kids wherever they’re at in their day — get them a good book.”
Wallman added that beyond the children, it is also important to engage the parents in the child’s reading journey. She says this helps the children develop conversational skills. Anahi Bracero works at the learning center and is also a mother with a child at the daycare. She says that literacy “weeks” like these and the center’s involvement in it has measurably helped her daughter.
“My daughter’s two now, and she’s been going here since she was about 18 months, and what I’ve seen so far is how great she’s progressed in reading," she said. "I know that in the lesson plans, they have to include reading every single week, and from what I’ve seen, my daughter has progressed so well.
"She’s trying to find books on her own. She’s reading to me at home. She’ll telling me what’s going on in the pictures, in the books. And it’s just amazing how much effort that these teachers put in each and every week to make sure these children are getting the literacy that they need, especially with the environment that we’re in," Bracero said. "I know that at times, there’s not a lot of parents that are reading to their kids, so it’s great that the teachers are incorporating that into their lesson plans weekly.”
