It’s a special honor to speak with adults who are as committed as I am to bringing books and children together. I am a mother and have been a daycare provider and a middle-school teacher…and I can tell you that the most magical moments I have experienced with children have been with books.

We all know how critical books are to the development of reading in a child. A good book and the joy it provides is often the reason a child is motivated to become a reader in the first place. Language is fun. Imagination is fun. And when a child experiences the joy of reading with a childcare provider or teacher, he or she is encouraged to take that next step and become a reader. And we all know that readers thrive, while non-readers fall behind in this world of the written word.

However, what I really want to remind you of is this: when you read with a child, you are doing so much more than teaching him to read or instilling in her a love of language. You are doing a much more powerful thing, and it is something that we are losing, as a culture. By reading with a child, you are teaching that child to be human. When you open a book, and share your voice and imagination with a child, that child learns to see the world through someone else’s eyes. I will go further and say that that child learns to feel the world more deeply, and the child becomes more aware of himself and others in a way that he simply cannot experience except in your lap, or in your classroom, or in your reading circle.

When we read books with children, we share other worlds, yes, but more importantly, we share ourselves. Reading with children makes an intimate, human connection that teaches that child what it means to be alive as one of many live beings on the planet. We are teaching empathy. We are naming feelings, expressing experience, and demonstrating love and understanding…all in a safe environment. When we read a book with children, then children – no matter how stressed, no matter how challenged – are drawn out of themselves to bond with other human beings, and to see and feel the experiences of others.

I believe it is that moment that makes us human. In this sense, reading makes us human.

The world can be a scary place. It can be a scary place for adults, but it is often worse for children. Children experience homelessness, hunger, abuse, and neglect. They can’t get in a car and leave a situation that they find challenging or displeasing. They can’t choose their own lifestyles. Children have very little control over their own lives. Children have to go where they are told and do what they are told to do, often with no apparent justification. They feel powerless. And the truth is, they often are powerless.

So, how do we help those small, often powerless people to grow up to feel strong and confident in this crazy world? How are our children going to feel safe? This happens when we teach children to love themselves, and to understand that there are other people who love them, too. Children need to feel that they are part of a loving, empathetic unit.

A child with a strong emotional center doesn’t hurt other children. It is the damaged child, the wounded child, who lashes out. And a damaged, wounded child grows to be a damaged, wounded adult unless he learns to soothe himself and feel safe in this world.

There are people on the planet who are incapable of empathy. But for most of us, empathy is learned. We learn it as children. Empathy is what keeps us from hurting each other on the playground, from cutting each other off on the highway, and from committing acts of terror and horror on other human beings. When we understand what makes us function, we can understand other people. When we understand that no matter how badly we feel, someone else may be feeling badly, too, we are able to step back and care for others. That is what living in a society is all about.

So, you are saying to yourselves: that’s a big job! And yes, it is. We teachers and caregivers can’t do all of it; parents have to do it, too. Society must also do it. But we can do our part, and here’s a really good way to go about it:

Sit down, put a child on your lap, and read a story. Have fun. Read in character. Use funny voices. Ask questions. Laugh and cry. Be human and be strong, and that will allow the children in your care to be human and be strong. And, they will also learn how to read.

Thank you.

This speech was delivered at the Fostering Lifelong Learners conference held on April 25, 2013 at the Cambridge Public Library in Cambridge, Massachusetts. For more from the conference, click here.

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Kitty Flynn, Lolly Robinson, and Martha Parravano discuss what works–and what doesn’t–in picture books for preschoolers.

From Dr. Robert Needlman explaining the difference between babies falling asleep and learning how to go to asleep, through Cambridge librarians Julie Roach and Beth McIntyre coaching us through selecting books for preschool story time to Anna Dewdney using photographs to demonstrate how to transform unpleasant expressions on family members faces into picture book gold, our Fostering Lifelong Learners event yesterday with Reach Out and Read and the Cambridge Public Library was a great success. The day was a little long but I learned a ton, and several attendees told us they got lots of good, practical ideas to use in their libraries and classrooms right away. We’ll be sharing some of the day with you next week, including Anna Dewdney’s inspirational speech, which she is graciously allowing us to publish on hbook.com. Julie Roach and I are already talking about what to do next year.

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Roger Sutton welcomes participants to the Fostering Lifelong Learners conference

The Doctors Panel: Dr. Robert Needlman, Dr. Lisa Dobberteen, Dr. Marilyn Augustyn

The Publishers Panel: Kathryn Bhirud (Penguin), Nancy Tran (DK), Megan Quinn (Charlesbridge)

The Critics Panel: The Horn Book’s Kitty Flynn, Lolly Robinson, Martha V. Parravano

Kitty Flynn perusing Gideon & Otto

Julie Roach, Cambridge Public Library Youth Services Manager, performing a read-aloud

Cambridge children’s librarian Beth McIntyre

Roger and company engage in small-group work

The Educators Panel: Anne MacKay, BB&N School, and Jim St. Claire, Amigos School

Dr. Kathy Modigliani, Family Childcare Project

Anna Dewdney, the Llama Lady

Author Anna Dewdney (left) and two Llama Llama fans

Author Stuart J. Murphy and a fan

Dr. Robert Needlman and Jackie Miller from Reach Out and Read

Two readers in action

Pictures from the Fostering Lifelong Learners conference. Photos by Shara Hardeson. For more on the day-long event, click here.

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keynote speaker Dr. Robert Needlman of Reach Out and Read

Horn Book Guide Executive Editor Kitty Flynn

Cambridge Public Library youth services manager Julie Roach

Llama Llama author/illustrator Anna Dewdney

For more information about the conference, see the full schedule and list of presenters. Expect to hear more during (we’ll be live tweeting) and after the event!

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Llama Llama…

1.What did your own children teach you about creating books for preschoolers?

My own children taught me several things about the reality of picture books.  First, that a book has to have compelling relevance to a child’s inner world to get picked up more than once or twice.  Second, that a picture book should be fun for everyone in the room (if it isn’t fun for the parent, then it is likely not fun for the child).  And third, that sometimes kids like seemingly unappealing books simply because those kinds of books address some developmental need; in other words, sometimes a parent will have to read Disney’s version of Cinderella every night for weeks…no matter how painful that is.  Most importantly, reading with my children taught me that “reading time” is often the most intimate moment of the day, and that its power in a child’s (or caregiver’s) world cannot be underestimated.

2.I enjoyed playing the Llama Llama game on your website. What are your thoughts about toddlers and iPhones?

I think that iPhones, iPads, Nooks, Droids, and all those gizmos are simply toys.  Whether or not a caregiver chooses to give that type of toy to a child is a personal decision.  As a parent, I can understand the use of a toy that has educational and entertainment value…after all, there are only so many car games a person can play on a six hour trip to Grandma’s house, and sometimes everyone (including a parent) needs down time.  I can also see value in a child learning some autonomous play skills, if they have a toy that teaches manual dexterity and/or reading.  However, if the toy is constantly being used as a substitute for the important stuff (creative play, interpersonal relationships, reading, and a sense of living on the real planet with living, breathing creatures), then I think it is no longer a toy for a child – it is a crutch for a parent, much like driving through McDonald’s instead of cooking real food.  I like a Big Mac as much as the next person, but I know it isn’t giving me real nourishment.

3.Why do you think young children accept the concept of animals dressed in clothing so easily?

What?  Are you implying that animals DON’T wear clothes? You haven’t met my bulldog!  (Just kidding.)

That’s a great question.  I think the answer may be that children can relate to animals.  Children know that animals are “people” too…they live, breathe, and exist on the planet, just as we do.  I don’t think children give a hoot about clothes until they start to see clothes as costumes that define them, and those costumes tend to be just that: costumes.  Why can’t dogs and cats (and llamas) wear costumes, too?  To children, animals aren’t the “other.”  After all, it is easier for a toddler to look right into the face of a lab than an adult; they can be eye to eye.

I think children are far more like animals than they are like adults.  In other words, I think that what differentiates an adult from a child is that an adult is often motivated from and controlled by things outside themselves, or by what Freud would call a strong ego and super-ego.  Small children are “unadulterated” beings.  They experience and recognize feelings in themselves and others much like animals do, without all that other stuff on top.

4.How does a picture book keep the reader-aloud and the read-to equally engaged?

A good picture book has to be engaging to the reader as well as the read-to, as I mentioned before.   It should allow the reader to become part of the action, to make the book a performance piece.   The reading of a picture book should be a special moment of mutual understanding that the reader, readee, and author all share.

5.Do kids ever ask you why llama has two ls?

Never.

Join us on Thursday, April 25, 2013, for a big day focused on the littlest people.

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Julie Roach

Cambridge Public Library youth services manager (and Horn Book reviewer) Julie Roach will be discussing library services for preschool children at our Fostering Lifelong Learners event (free; you should come) at CPL on April 25th. I asked her to share some of her thoughts on serving this (very) particular audience. (I think her answer to question #5 is one of the wisest things I’ve heard.)

1. What’s the most important thing about library service to preschoolers that you DIDN’T learn in library school and wish you had?

In library school you learn the theory and philosophy behind library service to preschoolers, which is as it should be.  Children’s librarians need a solid background there before venturing out on their own.  But I’m not sure any academic setting could have prepared me for what an emotional roller coaster a typical work day would be.  Every day with preschoolers and their entourage rockets back and forth between hilarity and tragedy, discovery and near-disaster (or sometimes full-on disaster) and the situation gets more complex depending on how many other people are in the space and their range of ages and stages.  In the mornings, our children’s room often has more than 200 people in it.  The drama is both utterly addictive and completely exhausting.

2. If you were suddenly told you had to do a story time in FIVE MINUTES, what would be your go-to stories?

This actually happens to me quite regularly!  Our storytimes skew pretty young, so I gravitate toward funny stories with very simple plots or concepts that invite kids to participate. They tend to involve animals or vehicles that make a lot of noise.  I also want to make sure the parents and caregivers get to laugh—I want them to see how fun this all is so, hopefully, they’ll go home and keep reading aloud.  I love Jan Thomas’s books, Bark George by Jules Feiffer, Do You Know Which Ones Will Grow? by Susan Shea, The Bus for Us by Suzanne Bloom, Grumpy Bird by Jeremy Tankard, Tiny Little Fly by Michael Rosen, A Perfect Square by Michael Hall, and Laura Vaccaro Seeger’s concept books.  And if the group is such that everyone can see a smaller book, I have fun using Olivier Dunrea’s gosling books.

3. What is the darndest thing a preschooler ever said to you?

This is one of the job’s best perks–a conversation with a preschooler can take you to a whole new dimension!  Although often they’re just saying out loud what everyone else is secretly thinking.  Once a very small but confident child approached the desk and dramatically looked around our rather large children’s room.  Then he looked right at me and demanded:  “Which one is the best book?”

4. If you could give publishers of preschool books one piece of advice what would it be?

Keep making those really great books, please!  The ones that make us laugh, the ones that make us think, the ones that make us gasp, the ones that make us a little scared, the ones that put us in charge.  We especially like them simple!

5. And if you could give parents of preschoolers one piece of advice, what would it be?

All of the books in the library are free to borrow and you get to return them later, so let your young child pick out a book too, on his own—even if his choice is impractical or too hard or too easy, even if you have a copy at home, even if it’s the unabridged edition of David Copperfield!  How empowering and special to get to choose your own book when you’re small.  How deflating to hear that your choice is not suitable for you.  Save some room in the library bag for the child to have a choice.

Join us on Thursday, April 25, 2013, for a big day focused on the littlest people.

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@KeenePLibrary: “Julie Roach sure does know how to read a kids’ book!”

On Thursday, April 25th, The Horn Book co-hosted the “Fostering Lifelong Learners: Prescribing Books for Early Childhood Education” conference with Reach Out and Read and the Cambridge Public Library. Unable to attend? Don’t worry; we’ve compiled the day’s highlights based on tweets by our staff and attendees.

9:52 am: “Fostering Lifelong Learners” conference opening remarks by @HornBook‘s Roger Sutton… Off to a great start!

10:07 am: Dr. Needlman: @reachoutandread partner clinics give board and picture books to patients at every well child checkup

10:17 am: “Our role as ROR doctors, maybe our most important role, is to join with parents in recognizing how brilliant their children are”

10:23 am: Dr. Needlman’s favorite library is actually located in the hospital where he works and is accessible to patients

10:28 am: Dr. Needlman: ROR is remarkably inexpensive and cost effective; investment in early education provides high social returns

10:30 am: Now time for panel with Dr. Needlman, Dr. Lisa Dobberteen, and Dr. Marilyn Augustyn plus video of ROR program in action

@KeenePLibrary, 10:33 am: 1 in 5 children has significant difficulty learning to read.

10:35 am: Dr. Augustyn: “Reading is to the mind what exercise is to the body” but as a society we are struggling with reading difficulties

10:39 am: Dr. Augustyn: Pediatricians are perfect choice for literacy interventions; encounter children frequently through crucial years

10:42 am: Dr. Augustyn: A child’s interaction with books tells so much about his/her development

@glecharles, 10:48 am: “We don’t get to see dads often.” Dr. Augustyn on a common theme in early literacy discussions… and publisher assumptions?

10:49 am: Dr. Augustyn: ROR is all about developing a “relationship around literacy” between families and their pediatric clinicians

@herlifewthbooks, 10:51 am: What’s keeping parents from reading with their kids? Time. How can libraries support these parents?

11:00 am: Dr. Dobberteen: As a clinician, “sharing the joys of reading with a family is unparalleled” experience

11:01 am: Dr. Dobberteen: Talking to families about reading is an intrinsically rewarding — and productive — part of a clinician’s day

11:05 am: Dr. Dobberteen, paraphrasing Natalie Babbitt’s Bub: “Reading is the very best thing to help children’s minds grow”

11:25 am: Guidance from pediatricians, great picture books, and opportunity for reading in waiting room all important aspects of ROR

@chaosinherwake, 11:48 am: Waiting with a kid? Read a book! Waiting rooms ripe for reading and ease the wait.

11:51 am: Charlesbridge, Penguin, and DK share their board and picture book picks

@reachoutandread, 11:24 am: @HornBook Thank you so much for your play-by-play tweets from the event! Hope all is going well!

@chaosinherwake, 1:17 pm: Catered lunch from S&S?! I am now ready to foster lifelong learners alllll day.

1:20 pm: @HornBook ladies Martha V. Parravano, Kitty Flynn, and Lolly Robinson offer picture book critics’ perspective

1:21 pm: @HornBook fun fact: our office receives about 6000 books for review each year!

@glecharles, 1:25 pm: This peek into @HornBook‘s editorial process for reviewing books reveals a passion for books and children as main ingredients.

1:27 pm: Martha Parravano: What to look for in a preschool book? Interesting subject matter, relatable characters, clean trajectory, plot with limited scope

1:29 pm: Martha Parravano: More good preschool book qualities: Appropriate pacing for audience, straightforward storytelling, interdependence of text and pics

@KeenePLibrary, 1:29 pm: Kitty Flynn: Book fail: Grandparent and parent trap books speaking to the adult experience and not the child’s.

@KeenePLibrary, 1:30 pm: Kitty Flynn: Early childhood book fails: Too much text, too much message, condescension

1:32 pm: Kitty Flynn: “All elements of a picture book should work together and support each other”

1:35 pm: Lolly Robinson: Reading a picture book silently is like reading music: “you have to imagine the performance” of reading it aloud with kids

1:40 pm: @HornBook ladies sharing some of their favorite recent books for preschoolers, including alphabet books

1:51 pm: Kitty Flynn: As a picture book reviewer, it’s important to read aloud with “test subjects” at home or in class to get child’s perspective

@chaosinherwake, 1:51 pm: Lolly Robinson: There’s a difference between personal taste and what makes a book good — match the book to the reviewer!

1:55 pm: Kitty Flynn: “We can’t talk about preschoolers without talking about truck books”

2:04 pm: @cambridgepl‘s Julie Roach and Beth McIntyre speak on early literacy and public libraries, starting with an interactive read aloud

@KeenePLibrary, 2:05 pm: Julie Roach sure knows how to read a kids’ book!

@glecharles, 2:06 pm: Julie Roach: Children’s librarians buy two kinds of books for collections: private/personal reading, sharing/group reading.

2:07 pm: Librarians handle collection development, book recommendations, programming, and outreach in community — whew!

2:09 pm: @cambridgepl‘s main branch (where conference is being held) has a collection of over 20,000 picture books!

@KeenePLibrary, 2:11 pm: Julie Roach: Kids look at visuals in books in a different way than adults do. They hone in on little details.

2:17 pm: Julie Roach: One goal of storytimes is to build attention spans

2:18 pm: Beth McIntyre: Books with very detailed illustrations work best when shared with an individual child rather than a group

2:20 pm: Beth McIntyre: When reading with a single child, let the child set the pace and explore tangents and details

@KeenePLibrary, 2:20 pm: Julie Roach: Wordless books are perfect to use with a group of ten kids. They can tell you the whole story.

2:29 pm: Librarians can help kids “get wiggles out” at storytime with “story stretchers” like songs/rhymes, crafts, puppets

2:33 pm: Julie and Beth make the grownups participate in storytimes so that readaloud techniques get taken home

3:09 pm: What should kids know before kindergarten? Educators Anne MacKay and Jim St. Claire discuss

@Kari_D_Allen, 3:15 pm: Great day so far at “Fostering Lifelong Learners” event @HornBook. So nice to be with so many people passionate about literacy.

@Kari_D_Allen, 3:18 pm: Jim St. Claire: Kids learn phonics through writing

3:19 pm: Jim St. Claire: Expectation that all kids should read by end of kindergarten is unrealistic; kids’ rates of development differ

3:26 pm: Jim St. Claire: Picture books, books in rhyme, nonfiction, books with patterns and repetition should all be made available to emerging readers

3:28 pm: Jim St. Claire: Expecting too much too early regarding reading can turn kids off; happens at different times for different kids

@chaosinherwake, 3:28 pm: Jim St. Claire: Today’s kindergarten curriculum is a lot like the first-grade curriculum of 10-12 years ago.

3:31 pm: Anne MacKay: Rhyme and alliteration help develop phonemic awareness

3:44 pm: Anne MacKay: Begin phonemic/syllabic awareness, alphabet recognition, basic book skills, motor skills, direction following before kindergarten

3:47 pm: Jim St. Claire: Are today’s kindergarteners struggling to develop fine motor skills and social skills?

3:54 pm: Anne MacKay: Great early literacy apps can help support learning to read in print — but may be best used as “special treat”

4:18 pm: Dr. Kathy Modigliani giving endnote on how family child care providers and literacy professionals can work together to develop literacy

@Kari_D_Allen, 4:29 pm: One’s literate life should not begin at preschool, should start much earlier.

4:31 pm: Dr. Modigliani’s workshops introduce family child care providers to library resources and good books for a range of ages

4:33 pm: Dr. Modigliani:Kids in child care should have access to books and toys of their own choosing for at least part of each day

4:36 pm: Dr. Modigliani: A “book hospital” at child care teaches kids to repair worn books. Roger: “To literally care for books”

4:38 pm: Roger: “Sounds like we’re all coming away with a laundry list of things we could be doing or doing better” regarding literacy

4:41 pm: Closing speaker is Llama Llama series author/illustrator Anna Dewdney. Roger introduced her as “a rock star to every 3-year-old you know”

4:43 pm: Anna Dewdney: “When we read books with children, we share other worlds, yes, but more importantly, we are sharing ourselves”

@chaosinherwake, 4:53 pm: Anna Dewdney: When you read to a child, you teach him to be human.

4:53 pm: Anna Dewdney: When reading with kids, “be human and strong.” They’ll “learn to be human and strong. And they will learn how to read”

4:57pm: Anna Dewdney: Mess is okay! “You can’t make anything cool unless you are willing to make a lot of mistakes”

The Fostering Lifelong Learners conference was held on April 25, 2013 at the Cambridge Public Library in Cambridge, Massachusetts. For more from the conference — including photos and Anna Dewdney’s closing speech — click here. Follow us on Twitter for updates on all things Horn Book.

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1. You were a book reviewer before you were a parent. How has the first job helped with the second?

Two words: review copies. After umpteen years of working at the Horn Book, I’ve amassed a pretty good and varied collection of children’s books. We’re never at a loss for something to read, and thankfully both kids love books (coincidence? Maybe, but having tons of books all over the house doesn’t hurt). There have been more than a few times that I’ve come upon one or both kids sitting (quietly!) and looking at a book—and that’s just the kind of help I need.

2. And how has the second job helped with the first?

Being a parent has and hasn’t informed my job as a book reviewer. What each of my kids likes is not an indicator of what other kids will like or of what makes an outstanding book. For example, Chloe can’t get enough of Blue’s [as in Clues] Sleepover Party, but that doesn’t mean I would recommend it to anyone else (unless that person deserves it).

I do like having my own captive audience to test drive reading books aloud, which helps a lot with reviewing picture books. And when they were infants, I even read some novels aloud to them—working and bonding at the same time!

Living with young children has allowed me to see childhood from a different angle. I recently reviewed Ole Konnecke’s Anton and the Battle, which I think captures perfectly how a four-year-old (boy, especially) thinks and plays. At one point in their proverbial pissing match, Anton and his frenemy, Luke, pretend to throw bombs at each other. I would have liked this book BC (before children), but I wouldn’t have had a clue how completely on-target the cartoony pretend-violent play is.

3. You have two preschoolers, a girl and a boy. Do you see any gender stereotyping in their book preferences?

My first reaction to this is that their preferences have more to do with their interests and temperaments than with their gender, but who knows? Jakob likes information and has a lot of patience; he’ll listen to a 128 page book about space if someone is willing to read it to him. He also likes fiction and nonfiction books about dinosaurs, construction, knights, firefighters, and other typical little boy topics, but he doesn’t limit himself to those things. If someone is reading a book, he’ll usually sit and listen, no matter what it’s about.

Chloe isn’t girly at all—she won’t look at a dress; her favorite color is black—but she does gravitate toward fiction rather than her big brother’s information books. She loves Curious George (like any self-respecting three-year-old), Leslie Patricelli’s board books, and any book with Humpty Dumpty in it. She likes folktales; Feodor Rojankovsky’s The Tall Book of Nursery Tales has been at the top of her morning story time pile for a few months now.

4. What are their current favorites?

Chloe and Jakob

Their favorites change from day to day, week to week. I asked this morning and they both said, “That superheroes book with Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman [a.k.a. DC Super Heroes Storybook Collection].” Last week the answer would have been, “Traction Man!” (that’s Traction Man Is Here by Mini Grey). They were obsessed with that book for a few days. We read it over and over; we acted out the story (with improvised Traction Man outfits and a pet scrubbing brush); we made a special trip to the library to borrow the other two TM books. But this week Traction Man is off the radar. Jakob has been studying The Usborne Official Knight’s Handbook. Chloe wants us to read “Puss in Boots” (and only “Puss in Boots”) from Anne Rockwell’s collection, Puss in Boots and Other Tales.

Oh, and I probably shouldn’t admit this, but for the last year (or maybe it just feels like a year), Jakob’s #1 favorite? The thirty-two page 2012 Playmobil toy catalog.

 5. What, in your opinion, is the most misguided choice for a baby shower book?

Along with a Playmobil catalog, any book that speaks more to new parents and their experiences/wishes/hopes than to a baby or a child…that is if the gift giver’s intention is really and truly to give the baby a gift. I’m sure many parents would like those books’ sentiments (in fact, I know many parents do like them), but kids themselves won’t give a poopy diaper about them.

Join us on Thursday, April 25, 2013, for a big day focused on the littlest people.

The post Five Questions for Kitty Flynn appeared first on The Horn Book.

I am so pleased that he will be keynoting our conference, Fostering Lifelong Learners: Prescribing Books for Early Childhood Education, to be held on April 25th at the Cambridge Public Library (free! Sign up!). The Horn Book is co-sponsoring this conference with CPL and with Reach Out and Read, of which Dr. Needlman is a co-founder and a member of its board of directors. Here I give him the five-question treatment.

1. You are one of the founders of Reach Out and Read. What led you to think that such a program was needed?

It was a combination of several things: being the son of a nursery-school teacher; living up the hill from a bookstore, where I found a copy of Jim Trelease’s Read Aloud Handbook; training in an interdisciplinary child development unit where we had doctors and educators working closely together; being trained to think about children and families holistically; and having a young daughter at home, reading to her every night.  It was exciting to realize that emergent literacy was a field that was not spoken of at all in the pediatric literature. Imagine that! A whole area of crucial child development which doctors seemed utterly unaware of. It was an opportunity that could not be passed up.

2. What did being a parent teach you about being a doctor?

Pretty much everything. The key to effective pediatric practice is empathy– being able to connect to the powerful feelings of love, hope, and fear which all of us parents share. Some gifted doctors can make this connection without being parents themselves, but for me it was the process of falling in love with my own child, and living in constant fear for her, that allowed me, as a young person, to make common cause with the parents in my care. I think these same forces keep me going today.

3. Your mother taught at the University of Chicago Lab School, which is justly proud of its storytelling and read-aloud traditions. What stories did she read or tell to you?

I don’t really remember stories she read to me. I do remember (or think I remember) listening to Tall Fireman Paul, while lying on the couch in the house where I grew up. And I remember many, many conversations about things that went on in my mom’s preschool classrooms– stories about the children and their learning, about things in the world and about their own feelings and ideas. My mother was, by every measure, an extraordinary teacher, and still is, in her 80′s.

4. What advice can you give to the parent who is shy about reading aloud?

I’m not sure what “shy” means in this context. Some parents hesitate to read aloud in front of other adults (that is, in front of me, in the clinic). They’re a bit shy about making goofy animal noises or really letting loose and enjoying the book.  But I think you might mean, instead of shy, unsure of themselves, doubting their ability to “do it right.” In these cases, advice may be useful, but I find direct hands-on demonstration and feedback to be more useful. If a mother can see how I do it (no magic, just having fun and trying to engage the child in a playful exchange), then she can often do it herself with me watching, and then I can point out the things that she and her child are doing that are just right , just what “reading” should be. I think this sort of hands-on in-the-moment teaching is something special that we as doctors have to offer.

5. What children’s book do you hope shows up at every baby shower?

I’m a fan of Pat The Bunny, because it appeals to multiple senses and invites a baby’s active exploration; I’m only sorry that it’s so narrow in its ethnic and cultural identification. For little babies, of course, it’s mainly the sound of the parent’s voice that is so attractive. So, any book that an adult might want to read would work fine.  Some parents I know read their latest romance potboiler, some read their chemistry textbooks, both fine choices. The classics, of course, need to be part of every childhood: Goodnight Moon, The Snowy Day, Where the Wild Things Are, of course, but also Stone Soup, Millions of Cats, Blueberries for Sal, and so many more. My own favorite was Time Of Wonder by Robert McCloskey. It lived on a high shelf, and my daughter knew it was special; we’d take it down and read it together when we felt in the mood.

Join us on Thursday, April 25, 2013, for a big day focused on the littlest people.

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