Unlocking the Infinite Possibilities of Books: Expanding Child Development Through Creative Interaction

Books are incredible tools for child development, especially if we adults understand their infinite possibilities. Using them beyond reading and playing with them is simple and has positive impacts

By: Irma Laura Uribe Santibáñez * / MUxED

Having access to books at home from birth has proven to have a key impact on people’s development. John Trischitti explains it very well: literacy (or literacy, in English, which I like better because it covers not only knowing how to read and write but also comprehension) is a flagship skill. This means that it is the foundation on which other skills are built. I could not agree more. Books help us develop and strengthen decoding, comprehension, vocabulary, structure skills; but also verbal, cognitive and even socio-emotional skills, in addition to promoting imagination, creativity and familiarity, even love, for the written word. And books can do all this before we can even read them.

Hence our mission in ateconqueso is to guarantee access to children’s books in Mexican homes. We are fully convinced that having books at home makes a difference, because it is a trigger for development. Mere access to books in homes so that, from an early age, girls and boys can explore them makes a difference, but the factor with the greatest impact is that adults act as “bridges” between girls, boys and books; To achieve this, we have to redefine books.

If we ask an adult what a book is and what it is for, the answers are limited: “a book is for reading”, “a book is for learning”, “a book is something that must be taken care of”… very serious answers. and boring, which are not false, since books are unquestionably learning tools. But in early childhood they are much more than that. The book, from the point of view of a boy or a girl, is an object, something that is touched, smelled, even sucked or bitten, that has different shapes and colors and, of course, a container of stories and stories. of moments of bond and attachment.

For girls and boys, a book, like almost anything, has the potential to be much more than its main object. Just as before children’s eyes a spoon becomes a drumstick, a book is a block to assemble, the wall of a house, a telescope, a hat,… it is a world of possibilities. If we add these possibilities to those of the book itself, with its letters and illustrations, its shared reading and its vocabulary, we have magic. In a single object there are endless opportunities to promote child development at home.

Back to the adults: it is us who have to understand the book with all its potential in order to become the bridges we want to be: between girls, boys and books. It’s very simple: we must allow ourselves to observe the book with all its potential and exploit it. In ateconqueso When we deliver books at no cost and train mothers and fathers to become these bridges, we explain to them that it is not about having extra work, nor about teaching girls and boys to read and write, but about promoting the development of skills with books and games as media.

We propose “one day – one skill”: Monday of observation, Tuesday of listening, Wednesday of conversation, Thursday of movement and Friday of free exploration. It sounds simple and even simplistic. However, it has great potential, in principle because even for adults who are saturated with tasks, it is fun and easy to apply. In addition, it promotes pre-reading and writing skills, so that sons and daughters arrive at school ready to learn to read and write, which eventually leads them to be able to learn more and better. Today, I share this methodology with you, hoping it will serve as inspiration to families, schools and communities. Please feel free to replicate it.

Observation Monday

Let him see what you are reading. Look at the cover together, slowly, attentively, not at your pace, at theirs: what do you observe, what do you like? Then see more covers without reading the books. Compare them. Look at letters, illustrations, look for greens, reds, blues, play “I spy”, look for “A” and “O”. Or, if they are already starting to read, look up words. Open the books and look for stars, now faces: What emotions do they show? Are there trees or plants in your book? Go out to the garden or window and look for a tree outside. They look alike? Which is bigger? Let them take the book and control. Advance the observation at a child’s pace. Are you looking at the book upside down? Don’t correct it. Let it happen.

Observation promotes the development of attention, cognitive development, as well as fostering curiosity and interest in books.

Listening Tuesday

Find the rhythm in reading. Rhymed texts are the best for this activity. It doesn’t matter if you are out of tune or if you read poetry like rap. Boys and girls love to listen. Read slowly and over-pronounce the words, modify the tone of your voice, invent voices. He exaggerates emotions: sadness, joy, suspense. She follows your reading with your finger so she can see where you are going. Let him listen her way: still and with his gaze on you, while he hugs his stuffed animal, crawls around the room, or builds a tower of blocks. Pay attention to his reactions. Comment on what happens in the reading. Now it’s your turn to listen.

Listening promotes language development, phonological awareness, self-regulation, attention, and meaning.

Conversation Wednesday

Talk to him or her, even if he or she isn’t talking yet. Ask him questions, allow him to answer (with sounds, words or his hands), to anticipate: What is going to happen next? How does the character feel? How would she feel in that situation? Where is something red? Come up with an ending or alternate title together. Even if they do not yet speak, speaking-listening interactions are extremely important to promote conversation in early childhood. You can start these interactions with closed questions (the answer to which is one word: yes, no, red, blue) and escalate to open questions to hear their opinions.

Conversation promotes the development of social skills (turn-taking, listening to others), confidence, narrative skills, vocabulary and emotional skills.

Thursday of movement

Take the books out of the bookshelf and leave them in a basket in the living room. Play arranging the books by color in different containers. Invite him to pick up a book and take it where it belongs: crawling, walking slowly, jumping, with his eyes covered. Build a fort and read in it together with a flashlight. Then destroy the fort. Set up a library in the kitchen to look at books while the soup is ready. Take the books to the park. Watch a book together and hug. At bath time, let him explore an indestructible book. Hold your hand while you read, even if you are older.

Movement and physical contact produce dopamine and dopamine makes us feel happy. If we create a relationship between happiness and books, the love for reading will come by itself.

Free Book Exploration Fridays

My favorite, because it forces us to take a step back. It’s about inviting the child and letting things happen: Maybe leave a book in the car and see what happens; or under her pillow; rearrange your small library by color; hang your books on cords; arrange them in a circle on the floor of her room or leave them in towers in the middle of the room. They are invitations that girls and boys enjoy, but so do adults. It forces us to get out of the everyday, appeals to creativity, generates expectation in us and surprise in them. The only rule is that anything goes: there is no wrong. They may or may not follow our invitation. Do what we expected or the opposite.

Free exploration promotes creativity, imagination, problem solving, resilience, self-regulation, curiosity and cognitive development, as well as emotional skills and of course, bonding.

Foto: ateconqueso

The interactions in which as adults we are fully attentive and immersed are few. Becoming bridges not only brings our daughters and sons closer to books and reading, it also promotes their development and, above all, strengthens our bond with them. Imagine how important you feel when your favorite person in the world, your closest connection, pays full attention to you, reads to you, plays with you, listens to you and responds to you. These experiences build a positive relationship with books and, most importantly, promote their development and lay the foundation for learning throughout their lives.

*Irma Laura Uribe Santibáñez is a member of MUxED. She is convinced that playing is the natural way to learn. She is an internationalist from the University of the Americas Puebla, a Master in Political Economy from the University of Toronto and has a postgraduate degree in Strategy for Social Impact from the University of Pennsylvania (Penn). She is a mother, reader and author. She worked on public policies for children and youth at the UNDP and the IDEA Foundation. She founded ateconqueso in 2015 where she works for child development.

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2023-10-25 06:49:33
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