LISNews: Information, Knowledge and Wisdom

Little Kids and Public Libraries
By Larry T. Nix

By far the best acronym that I ever came up with was the one for a federally funded project which demonstrated the role of public libraries in serving children ages birth to three while I was Director of the Greenville County Library in South Carolina. It was called Project LITTLE KIDS which stood for Learning by Infants and Toddlers Through Library Experiences – Kits Information Demonstrations and Services. The project was funded by the Appalachian Regional Commission and carried out by the Greenville County Library during a three year period starting in 1977. The concept and idea for the project came from Greenville’s extraordinary Coordinator of Children’s Services Mary Aiken. I contributed the acronym (which wasn’t actually used as an acronym, it was simply Project Little Kids) and the decision to go for a large comprehensive grant instead a smaller grant originally proposed by Mary. The foundation for the project was early learning and brain development theory that documented the critical importance of learning in the first three years of life. Nationally known early learning expert Dr. Alice Honig of Syracuse University was engaged as a consultant on the project. The library hired a full time early childhood development specialist to administer the project, established one of the first toy libraries in a public library in the nation, and implemented a wide array of programs for infants, toddlers, parents, and care givers. In 1978 the project received the Southeastern Library Association’s first Award of Merit for an Outstanding Library Program. In 1979 The Department of Health, Education, and Welfare officially cited Project Little Kids as an “exemplary Project.”

In recent years public libraries across the nation have routinely implemented library programs targeting very young children. In 1993 the Wisconsin Division for Library Services implemented a Library Services and Construction Act (LSCA, now LSTA) grant program to promote early literacy activities in public libraries. It resulted in the 1995 publication Read from the Start. Even more recently, the Public Library Association and the Association for Library Service to Children have developed the Every Child Ready to Read project http://www.ala.org/ala/mgrps/divs/alsc/ecrr/index.cfm . An excellent example of a program for children birth to six years has been implemented at the Multnomah County Library in Portland, Oregon http://www.multcolib.org/birthtosix/ .

The reason that I cite these early and recent examples of public libraries serving very young children is that I don’t understand why this effort is not being implemented on an even larger scale by the public library community with state and major national support. The science behind the importance of learning in children ages birth to three is overwhelming. Public libraries have proven they can implement excellent programs to serve this age group. The public education community is struggling to implement four year old kindergarten much less provide programs for this age group. There is a tremendous opportunity for public libraries to take ownership of learning in the most important years of a child’s life. And, of course, a major audience for these services is the parents and care givers of children in the early years of their life. I’m old school. I believe that libraries really do change lives. We should be putting our best efforts behind one of the programs that has the best chance of doing just that. Why are public library administrators not recognizing and seizing on this opportunity. Why can’t we come up with major national and state funding programs to help public libraries take a major leadership role in this area?