Story Storks Bring a Love of Reading to Newborns By Cheryl Lynne Potter
“Having access to language and literacy tools from the very beginning, gives every child early access,” said Evans. “Reading, singing, talking, and even making up stories, helps to increase the language that babies gain access to as parents and caregivers interact with them,” she said. “Story Storks starts the conversation about early education and provides a book, our hope is that it starts a practice and routine of reading for life.”
T
hink your newborn is too young to reap the rewards of reading. Well, think again. Research shows it’s never too early to read aloud to your baby. It doesn’t matter that they can’t understand what you’re saying, they still can pick-up on the rhythm, tones and inflections of your voice. You may even notice after reading to them for awhile, their arms and legs begin to move in rhythmic movements to your voice. Reading to your newborn has a lot of long-term benefits that can be useful to children later on in life. What a shame that every parent does not read aloud to their newborn. As a teacher, it was difficult, said Adrienne Evans, to “watch students struggle with reading, never having access to books or someone reading to them.” This bothered her so badly that she and her colleague, Maureen Hicks, decided to make a difference in the lives of these children
6 | March 2019
by starting a nonprofit organization called, Story Storks. This group helps to give new parents and caregivers the realization that it’s never too early to start reading. The organization also helps to get books in the hands of children. The group was started while Evans and Hicks were both working towards their Master’s Degree in Reading Education. “We were working with elementary and middle school aged children that were attending the summer clinic for remediation. Class after class, we kept realizing that the students needing the most help had similar experiences prior to school - no experiences with books or literacy,” said Evans. “We wanted to come up with a way to change that - When a baby leaves the hospital with all of the things to get a great start, why wasn’t anyone talking about literacy and the importance of reading?” Right then and there the idea of Story Storks was born.
When calling advertisers, please say you saw it in SJMOM!
Research shows it’s never too early to read aloud to your baby. It doesn’t matter that they can’t understand what you’re saying, they still can pick-up on the rhythm, tones and inflections of your voice. The program, which is now in 5 hospitals, has given away close to 20,000 board books. Each book is personalized with a sticker that has your own baby footprints on it, as well as delivery of other educational items while moms are still in the hospital. Moms don’t even have to register to participate in the program. Often times, hospital’s will add presentations about the program to their childbirth classes or volunteers at each hospital will tell new parents that they visit about the importance of reading to their newborn. If one child or even one family, she said, “sees the value in literacy because of our program, we have done what we set out to do— create future readers starting at birth.”
www.southjerseymom.com