Don’t be surprised if the next time you visit your pediatrician, he or she writes you a prescription for reading. In 2014, the American Academy of Pediatrics announced a new policy: Doctors will advise parents to read aloud to their infants from birth. And they’ll provide free books, too (Dehnel, 2016).
In the past, the Academy, which represents 62,000 pediatricians nationwide, has made recommendations about how long mothers should breastfeed their infants and other child development issues; however, this is the first time they have officially aligned with an early literacy program (Rich, 2014). The Academy has partnered with Reach Out and Read (2014), a nonprofit organization that encourages families to read aloud together by incorporating books into pediatric care. Reach Out and Read has been in operation since 1989. Its first program was run at Boston Medical Center (formerly Boston City Hospital). By 2001, the Reach Out and Read model was operating in all 50 states; today, the program distributes 6.5 million books per year to 4.5 million children. According to Read Out and Read (2014), one in five of those children live in poverty.
Through Reach Out and Read’s program, children get a new, age-appropriate book to take home at every checkup from age 6 months through 5 years. That means, each child will start kindergarten with a home library of up to 10 books. The organization’s read-aloud message is clear: In families that read together more often, their children will enter kindergarten with larger vocabularies and stronger language skills.
“’If we can get that first 1,000 days of life right, said Dr. Dipesh Navasaria, an assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health and the medical director of the Wisconsin chapter of Reach Out and Read, ‘we’re really going to save a lot of trouble later on and have to do far less remediation’” (Rich, 2014). That sounds like a remedy we all can agree on.
About reach out and read. (2014). Retrieved from http://www.reachoutandread.org/about-us.
Dehnel, Chris. (2016, February 20). Pediatrician believes reading is medicine for the mind. McClatchy-Tribune Business News. Retrieved from ttp://elibrary.bigchalk.xaaa.orc.scoolaid.net.
Rich, Motoko. (2104, June 24). Pediatrics group to recommend reading aloud to children from birth. The New York Times. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/24/us/pediatrics-group-to-recommend-reading-aloud-to-children-from-birth.html.
Book Distribution Programs
Reach Out and Read National Center Reading Rocket
617-455-0600 www.reachoutandread.org In Search of Free Books
Readingrocket.org
Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library Reading is Fundamental
Imaginationlibrary.com 877-RIF-READ http://www.rif.org
Reading Aloud:
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