Fifty years ago, it was almost unthinkable for a woman to send her children to a daycare so she could work. Today, it is more acceptable for parents to take their children to day cares, and many do. As families become busier and emphasis on raising children moves away from the stay-at-home mother ideal of the 1950’s, traditional daytime visits by children in public libraries are also decreasing.

“While we have watched our audiences change in numbers over the years, dwindling, in may cases, because parents are working and children are in day-care placements, the demographics of our audiences have not changed. Traditionally, morning storytimes held in libraries appeal to those families that are financially secure enough to have one parent or caregiver stay at home with the children” (Lamme 36).

Traditional storytimes during weekday working hours are attracting fewer children across the country. To reach out to working families some libraries have tried weekend and evening story hours to bring in more working families. This is a wonderful method, but typically reaches children whose parents are likely to bring them to the library on their own. To reach out to new groups of children, libraries need to do outreach where the children are—in childcare centers. In this paper, I will attempt to give a brief overview of the history of childcare outreach, new methods for this outreach and to evaluate the effectiveness of this outreach as a whole.

Outreach to children in daycares is important for a variety of reasons. A plethora of studies have shown the importance of early introduction to books and storytimes in child development. When parents do not have the time to bring their children to the library or read to them on a consistent basis they are automatically at an educational disadvantage. If outreach to children starts only when they arrive at school they are further disadvantaged because the child may have already have had far less exposure to books. An effort by public libraries to reach children in childcare settings will only benefit their development, and may perhaps even bring new patrons to the library.

The need for outreach is especially strong for young children in home-based centers, also known as family day care homes. Most low-income families cannot afford to send their children to formal day cares and instead use home-based centers while they work. Unfortunately, those same centers are the ones that are least likely to come to the library for storyime because of transportation issues. Home-based day care centers in low-income areas are also less likely to have books available for the children to use (Lamme 36).

Looking back historically, the Industrial Revolution brought many broad changes to society; one change was the introduction of day nurseries to the United States. Day nurseries were childcare for the lower classes when women couldn’t afford to stay home with their children and instead had to work menial jobs, such as factory work. Although day nurseries broadened to more groups as time progressed, such as Civil War widows, they still remained drastically sub-par compared to care and upbringing within the home. During World War II, childcare came to be more acceptable, but as the war finished the expectation for women to return to their homes led again to the previous, negative mentality of childcare (Carlson 58-61).

Interestingly, chronicled library outreach to daycares follows this historical usage and popularity of childcare. In 1945, Jen cook published an article in Library Journal discussing the need for books in the proliferating daycares and the selection and envelopment of rotating book collections for centers. Until the 1960’s, there are no more documented occurrences of library outreach to daycares (which, in consideration of the attitudes towards daycares, it is entirely understandable). During the mid to late 1960’s, the women’s movement brought more women into the workplace and, consequently, more children into childcare centers. The first library to reach out to this new group of centers was the Brooklyn Public Library, which, in 1965, provided story hours outside of the library to children in day cares. By the late 1970’s libraries across the country had regular services established for teachers and day care providers (Carlson 35-7).

The most effective way for a library to get into contact with day care centers and maintain regular contact is through a newsletter, (in this paper, when discussing day care providers I am referring to formal Government-subsidized centers, for-profit centers, and non-profit centers). Directories and word of mouth are both effective methods in locating the addresses of formal day care centers. Successful newsletters have craft and activity ideas, booklists, and library and local events (Denniston 8-9).

Contacting home-based centers can be more difficult than contacting formal day care centers because they are smaller and often there are so many of them. Newsletters have also worked effectively for providers in home-based systems. Finding the non-advertised home-based centers would most likely include contacting state licensing departments for addresses. These addresses, once acquired, are not always accurate so requesting address correction will help decrease the amount of money wasted on undeliverable mail (Denniston 40).

Although more expensive, libraries can also reach out to all kinds of childcare centers through advertising. Some libraries have had success advertising in newspapers, television, radio, and even on grocery bags (“Make Books Part of Your Child’s Diet, Visit Your Public Library Today”). Sometimes publicity workshops or special program kick-off events bring more publicity as well (Denniston 45-7).

Newsletters and advertisements may reach childcare providers, but many still face issues that kept them from visiting the library. The most notable issue is transportation. For day care centers problems such as having access to car seats and staff to take a trip to the library can be difficult. Small children with specific naptime schedules can make trips to the library prohibitive. Even if these problems were solved some providers will still not be interested in taking the extra effort to get to the library (Denniston 66).

Newsletters and advertising can be used to do more than bring childcare providers into the library; it can also be used to create contacts. Once contacts are developed between childcare centers and libraries, the most common form of outreach to day cares are special storytimes presented by librarians in the childcare center. This requires no extra training for the librarians—and they will often use the same story programs that they use at the library. In the Iowa City area, the libraries are especially active in this kind of outreach. Linda Parker of the Coralville Public Library visits seven day cares on a monthly basis for half hours storytimes.

Contacts for these in-center storytimes aren’t necessarily from newsletters. At the North Liberty Community Library, librarian Lois Hatch began noticing that when a day care showed up for her regular in-library storytimes the group was disruptive. The children were so familiar with each other that they changed the dynamic of the storytime for those children that were not a part of the center. So Ms. Hatch began a special storytime at that center which she finds very rewarding, “They love songs and finger plays and usually carry them through the rest of the week or season. One group liked a song I taught them so well they performed it for a local nursing home.” This shows us that even if a day care comes to the library it still may not work as well as librarians might hope.

As in Iowa City, North Liberty, and Coralville, librarians in many communities find time to visit large day care centers. But, the visits are rarely as often as they would like, and the centers always seem to want more visits. Multnomah County Library in Oregon started a “Create A Reader Early” (CARE) program in 2002. Volunteer-led, the CARE program attempts to visit at least 20 childcare centers a month. Volunteers are trained in different methods for stimulating a love of books in babies during their 45-minute visits; including songs and book-handling techniques. This program was well liked by the volunteers and the childcare providers (Arnold 39).

Although the program in Multnomah County was successful, some programs do not have the same luck with volunteers in their communities. In an attempt to reach home-based day cares the Alachua County Library District in Florida tried a volunteer story-sharing program. They planned to train the volunteers in the library who would then bring books and read to the children in home-based centers. To find volunteers the library advertised through newspaper, radio, and television; they found four volunteers. “In reality, because the program relied entirely upon volunteers from the community-at-large, it was doomed to fail” (Lamme 37).

In an attempt to save the program, the Alachua County Library District instead turned to students at the University of Florida. Their joint effort evolved into Project Booktalk in which students enrolled in the children’s literature course were assigned a home-based day care to visit on a weekly basis. Students would bring ten new books with them every week that they would leave at the center until their return (Lamme 37).

The students were required to go through a two-hour workshop at the library to prepare them that focused on choosing stories, methods for presenting, and ways to recognize children’s responses. Unlike volunteers, the students could not drop the program because it was required for their class, but they weren’t interested in stopping their participation either. The classroom setting had unexpected benefits because the students had the opportunity to discuss difficulties with children from their home-based centers and to get the input of their teacher and peers (Lamme 38).

Project Booktalk was mutually beneficial for all involved in the program. The library was able to increase circulation of their books and to reach a group of children that would otherwise be neglected. The opportunity to watch children’s reading responses was invaluable for the college students and many of them encountered class and ethnic groups that they had not before. The home-based care providers could have books brought directly to the children in their centers on a regular basis and could discuss the development of the children with others on a weekly basis, which they also found rewarding. Most importantly, the children had an opportunity to bond with books on a regular basis, which will hopefully encourage a lifelong love of books and reading (Lamme 39).

With any outreach program (and outreach to day cares is no exception) solid objectives for programs and constant feedback allow for programs to grow and change to better serve the community. Communication between librarians and childcare providers will help improve the outreach program and help to serve the children optimally. Among the staff performing the outreach it also important not to alienate childcare centers by missing an appointment due to miscommunication within the library.

Because librarians cannot go to every childcare center or send trained volunteers or students, some libraries create story kits especially for childcare providers to use. In 2000 Pueblo City County Library District in Colorado started a Children Sharing and Training (CSAT) Program. The kits in this program consisted of five picture books, a media item (puppet, video, or audiotape), and a library activity sheet with ideas and games to go with the kit’s respective theme. Activity sheets had pedagogical explanations for all activities listed so anyone using the kits could have a basic understanding of the principles behind the activities. The program was so successful that in 2001 they had 100 story kits in circulation (Irving 35-6). Pueblo’s CSAT Program encouraged the use of their story kits by offering free training sessions with attendance certificates; they advertised the sessions in Pueblo’s daily newspaper and sent mailings to early childhood centers (Irving 36).

Presenting programs for child care providers is another method that libraries have for outreach to daycares. Pueblos’ CSAT sessions are one example, and Indiana’s Indiana Marion County Public Library’s Sesame Street Preschool Education Program is another. In 1994, the goal of this program was to reach childcare providers for “at risk” children by providing educational workshops and a reading incentive program. Sponsored by the Preschool Education Program, free education workshops for childcare providers lasted about six hours and focused on storytelling techniques, the advantages of educational television programming, and tours at local library branches. The local branch tours showed providers how to use the library and also where Preschool Education Program sponsored posters, puppets, and books were located. After the programs, providers could participate in the Big Bird Book Incentive Plan, which allowed providers to check out 25 books at a time for their centers; if providers checked out and returned 100 library books they were awarded a free book. If providers earned four free books for their center they received seven stuffed Sesame Street characters (Wissel 30).

In 1997, the Waterford Public Library in New York began circulating “story kits” from satellite library collections in five area day care centers. The story kits consisted of two books and an activity or puppet in easy to carry bags. Each center had approximately 25 story kits and circulated them with a simple sign in/sign out process—some centers had due dates, others did not. To supplement the story kits the library held a kick-off program at the library and librarians gave a presentation for parents and providers at each of the sites on storytelling techniques. The story kits turned out to be extremely popular. Feedback through surveys showed that the parents appreciated the service, “this is a wonderful program—the children get their first experience of the library—it’s very useful” (Bagley “Making Connections”).

The Iowa City Public Library does not have a satellite collection in day cares, but it does have two neighborhood center libraries. The collections in these libraries were donated by the Iowa City Public Library and staff there maintains the books. Katherine Habley says, “my colleague and I go to each site quarterly to weed, shelve, add, mend the collections used at these places in government subsidized housing neighborhoods.”

Traditional library outreach to childcare centers involves storytimes in the centers by librarians. Most libraries now have programs like these and the programs (such as in-center storytimes by volunteers or students, library training for childcare providers, satellite book collections, etc.) that are less common are the ones appearing in the library literature. The library literature concerning outreach to childcare centers certainly makes it appear that in the past five to ten years libraries have been trying to step away from programs where librarians hold storytimes at childcare centers and are trying different ways to get, not the childcare providers, but the parents involved. This emphasis on new ideas is an element of healthy growth for any outreach program but it also shows that the programs that were in the literature are not entirely successful. But, unsuccessful in what sense? Libraries are reaching children and exposing them to books, but are they bringing in new patrons to the library?

Julie Lee of Love-A-Lot Childcare in Iowa said that they have been receiving regular monthly visits form a Coralville librarian for three years and they actually take fewer trips to the library as a group since the librarian comes to them and because of the extra staff visiting the library requires. She said it is hard to get to the library for many parents but they participate more actively in book club programs with their children because of the librarian’s storytimes.

“It has been my observation that parents and caregivers are often too busy today to find time for the library, even when offered a free give (e.g., the incentive book) in return. If library visits fit into their schedules they will bring home books and share them with the children. But if borrowing books requires one more stop at the end of a long and tiring day, library books may not be apart of their children’s experience” (Bagley “Making Connections”).

Laura Lage works at Handicare, a day care in Iowa that is visited regularly by Coralville librarians, and expressed similar sentiments. When discussing library visits to the center she said, “The library is a bit hit with our kids,” but said she had not seen an increase among families in the center and library usage.

The question then becomes, should libraries be serving the library space or the children? Although trips to the library are important for statistics and to validate the existence and maintenance of in-building library services, they should not be the sole reason for performing outreach of any kind. Public librarians should first and foremost be serving their communities. Although it would be wonderful to say that increased childcare outreach dramatically increases actual library usage—it would not be true. Children’s librarians should focus on getting books into the hands of children. The Waterford Public Library in New York and their satellite library collection from childcare centers is an exciting way to reach out to children who do not have the opportunity to come to the library. Likewise, the Iowa City Public Library’s neighborhood libraries serve the same purpose. Collections that reach out to the community benefit the community.

Of course, satellite collections and neighborhood libraries still may not reach home-based centers. To reach out to those centers, Project Booktalk of the Alachua County Library District in Florida seems ideal. Not only does it bring storytimes to children who would not otherwise have the opportunity, it brings new books to the center on a regular basis. Unfortunately, not all library systems have universities in the vicinity, but an adaptation of the system could have benefits for any community.

New technologies, especially computers, as of yet have not been offered to children in day care centers. But, outreach service to libraries shouldn’t need to change for these new technologies. Although information literacy is an important commodity it is only supplemental to book literacy. If a child cannot read, what they can learn from computers is minimal—outreach service to day cares should focus on helping children learn to love reading. Information literacy can come later.

Although it does not necessarily increase usage of the library, outreach to childcare centers still has many benefits. One of the best results, outside of encouraging a love of books in children, is the development of a connection between day cares and librarians. Librarians have an opportunity to become aware of the needs of childcare centers in their area, and childcare providers can become aware of all the resources available to them at the public library (Denniston 31). Librarians are serving an important and valid service to the community by reaching out to children in childcare centers and exposing them to books. As our society continues to evolve and change, public library outreach will need to as well, but as long as libraries are putting their materials and books into the hands of its patrons they are performing a valid and meaningful service to their communities.

Works Cited

Arnold, Renea. “Into the Mouths of Babes”. School Library Journal. 50:4 (2004): 39.

Bagley IV, Norman E. “Making Connections: Outreach to Preschoolers through Satellite Library Collections”. Journal of Youth Services in Libraries. 13:3 (2000). 2 December 2004.

http://wilsontxt.hwwilson.com/pdfhtml/02022/Z1DEV/7SU.htm.

Carlson, Ann D. The Preschooler & The Library. Metuchen, NJ: The Scarecrow Press, Inc., 1991.

Denniston, Susan. Library Child Care Link: Linking Libraries and the Child Care Community. Santa Clara, CA: South Bay Cooperative Library System, 1985.

Habley, Katherine. khabley@icpl.org “Questions forwarded by Debb Green” 03 December 2004. Personal email. (03 December 2004).

Hatch, Lois. jgarner@north-liberty.lib.ia.us “from children’s librarian Lois Hatch, North Liberty” 02 December 2004. Personal email. (02 December 2004).

Irving, Jan. “Children Sharing and Training: Library Outreach to Day Care Centers”. Colorado Libraries. 28:1 (2002): 35-6.

Lage, Laura. Telephone Interview. 03 December 2004.

Lamme, Linda Leonard and Roseanne Russo. “Project Booktalk: Library Outreach to Family Daycare Homes”. Journal of Youth Services in Libraries. 15:3 (2002): 36-40.

Lee, Julie. Telephone Interview. 03 December 2004.

Parker, Linda. lparker@coralville.lib.ia.us “Coralville Public Library” 02 December 2004. Personal email. (02 December 2004).

Wissel, Melanie. “Big Bird Does Outreach”. School Library Journal. 41 (1995): 30.