At your library. Libraries are trusted, welcoming places where children make discoveries, expand words and knowledge, and connect their natural curiosity to the world. Libraries level the playing field for children of all income levels, providing free and accessible learning opportunities that help prepare young children for school.
However, many families in Idaho, especially those of lower socioeconomic levels, are not accessing books and other learning opportunities from their local library. Behind from the start. Idaho State Department of Education statistics from the fall of 2017 indicate that almost 63% of low-income children (those qualifying for free or reduced lunch) entered kindergarten with less than a proficient level of literacy readiness.
Research shows that children who start behind will stay behind and in many cases, continue to lose ground, making it more likely they will need costly remediation, be retained, or even drop out of school.
From Growing Young Minds: How Museums and Libraries Create Lifelong Learners, 2013:
It takes a village. Research provides strong evidence of the critical importance of community- or place-based efforts in supporting children’s growth and development, especially in the earliest learning years. Local conditions can have a major impact on whether children succeed, and challenges must be addressed within the context of the community to assure effective solutions are reached. To that end, communities across the nation are coming together to develop plans to address problems and put policy strategies into action.
At the heart of these efforts is an understanding that real change will only be accomplished through broad-based, multi-sector collaboration. Libraries are well-positioned to be integral parts of coordinated efforts, but are too often untapped or disconnected resources in community efforts to support more positive outcomes for families and children.
Librarians are important facilitators of learning: they are anchoring their practices in research and partnering with other community service providers to provide high-quality, informal learning opportunities; and they are creating environments, programs, and experiences that expand and deepen the abilities of our youngest learners, their families, and caregivers. In turn, communities are beginning to recognize that libraries are key components of their early learning infrastructure, and school leaders are recognizing that engaging public and school librarians can improve children’s outcomes in school.
The Idaho Commission for Libraries’ Kindergarten Readiness Grant supports library-led, community-based efforts to:
- Increase high-quality early learning experiences
- Increase access to library services (books, materials, and digital resources) for underserved children and their families
- Engage and support families as their child’s first teacher
- Create multi-level approaches that advance third-grade reading proficiency and promote kindergarten readiness
- Address the Summer Slide
- Link digital technology to learning
- Leverage community partnerships
- Add capacity to early learning networks
There are many exciting projects, partnerships, models, and best practices currently taking place in communities nationwide (see Resources and Examples below). Whether you are building on existing early learning partnerships, or thinking of new ways to collaborate to serve your preschool families, this grant funding will support high-quality, innovative, and impactful projects that increase the number of children entering kindergarten ready to learn.
The Idaho Commission for Libraries offers a grant to build the capacity of Idaho public libraries to better prepare preschool children to be successful in school. The Kindergarten Readiness grant provides state funding to help public libraries partner with their local school districts and other community partners to reach children and their families before they enter school.