Monthly tips for parents
Rediscover Your Public Library
By: Reading Rockets
Libraries are great resources for families with young children; you can find books, entertainment, educational and cultural enrichment, literacy tips, and other valuable information. Here are nine reasons to visit your public library!
For families with young children, the public library is a great place to find entertainment, educational or cultural enrichment, or valuable information.
Top 9 reasons to go visit
- Free programs and activities: From author visits to puppet shows to family films, libraries offer programs with kid appeal after school, on the weekends, and during the summer. Ask your librarian for the schedule of upcoming events.
- Story times: There's nothing like hearing a good story read by someone who loves to read aloud. Libraries are terrific settings for story times which often include finger plays, games, songs, and crafts that can be learned and enjoyed again at home.
- Workshops: Many libraries offer workshops that can help enrich your life as an adult and support you as a parent. At many libraries, it is possible to learn to knit, prepare your taxes, update your resume, gain computer skills, or improve your parenting skills.
- Books: Librarians are happy to make recommendations and most public libraries have a special section just for children's books.
- Audiobooks: Listened to a good book lately? Most libraries have a collection of popular adult and children's titles available for checkout on tape or CD.
- Movies: Your public library is a great source for free access to the latest blockbusters, family movie classics, documentaries, or favorite TV shows.
- Music: Want to introduce your children to Beethoven or the Beatles or new children's songs? Check to see if your library has a collection of music on CD.
- Magazines and newspapers: Introduce your child to some of the magazines designed just for children. With bold photographs, poems and a joke or two, magazines are another reading choice for beginning readers. Or catch up on the news in your community and share a smile over the comics.
- Computers: Most public libraries offer free Internet access, computers with educational games for kids, and valuable online resources for teenagers.
Libraries are also working to get more of their own resources online. Your local library may have its own website with links to other resources within your community. If you're looking for the internet or the street address of your local public library, ilovelibraries.org offers several places to look.
- Download this article as a PDF document.
- View this article in Spanish.
Reading Rockets (2009)
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Timothy Shanahan
Dr. Joanne Meier
I love using your articles in the monthly newsletters that I send home to parents of children in my preschool class. I have made many of these recommendations and am happy to be able to present parents with additional ways to help their child at home. Keep up the good work.