Much More Than Books:
The Born to Read Volunteer Program
It’s easy to recognize long-distance grandparents. They’re the ones reaching for their photo albums at the slightest provocation, researching the best telephone rates, and honing their e-mail and digital picture-viewing skills. Perhaps you even recognize yourself in this description. If so, you’re not alone. Linden Thigpen of Cape Elizabeth “was missing her grandchildren terribly” after they moved to North Carolina. In 2000, she stumbled upon the Born to Read volunteer program, and ever since, she has spent an hour or two every week at Rubber Ducky Daycare and Preschool. Many of the children in this program, run by Peg and Joe Campbell in a wing of their South Portland home, have known Linden since they were infants. They squeal with delight when she arrives, eager to show off their newest toys and T-shirts, their most impressive scrapes and bruises. When she turns to her special bag of books, they vie for the honor of sitting on her lap and clamor to see what stories she has brought them. Linden treasures this time as her weekly “little kid fix,” and calls it one of the high points of her week.
Linden is one of about a hundred participants in the Born to Read volunteer program. In 1998, Born to Read formed a partnership with the Retired Senior Volunteer Program (RSVP) to recruit and train seniors interested in reading aloud to children and offering other forms of literacy support to early childhood educators. Since then, a network of volunteer readers has grown, quietly but steadily, from Caribou to Kittery. Through reading, singing, playing games, and other activities, volunteers bring the kind of stimulating early literacy experience that all children need in their formative years.
It’s difficult to describe the Born to Read volunteers, for they are a varied group. Some, like Joan Beckford of Bangor, are retired early childhood educators themselves, while others have virtually no experience with children. Some visit small, home-based child care programs like Rubber Ducky Daycare. Others, like Adrien Deschenes of Rockland, read at Head Start or other community-based centers. Volunteers like Roberta Carlstrom of Jay have been active since the program’s first year, while new recruits like Barbara Korn of Parsonsfield, who just discovered the program in December, help satisfy the constant demand for readers. But every Born to Read volunteer shares a love of books and a commitment to the well-being of children.
When new volunteers first enter the program, they are trained in early literacy practices and given a volunteer manual and a set of four books to take to the site they’ve been assigned. The local RSVP volunteer coordinator will often accompany them on their first visit. These coordinators do everything they can to ensure that the volunteers, teachers, and children feel comfortable together—Linden calls the Cumberland County coordinator, Priscilla Greene, “a genius at setting up matches.” RSVP provides ongoing support and recognition to all volunteers, while Born to Read offers volunteer trainings and enrichment opportunities. For instance, a series of workshops in 2004 featured Gratia Banta, a Portland resident who will chair next year’s Caldecott Award committee for the American Library Association.
Every year, Born to Read provides a new hardcover book for every site with a volunteer reader, as well as a new book for every child to take home. Since the program began, approximately 15,000 books have been distributed. But even this reliable supply can’t satisfy the hunger for books, and once volunteers have exhausted their supply of Born to Read books, they get creative.
Barbara Korn relies on her personal library of over 1,000 children’s books, collected over approximately forty years as a librarian. “I’ve been a public librarian; high school, elementary school, and parochial school librarian; Head Start librarian; and Future Farmers librarian. Born to Read nearly satisfies the one job I never found: prenatal librarian!” Barbara feels most comfortable reading her old favorites, but she also consults the children’s librarians in Parsonsfield and Limerick so that she can incorporate notable new books.
Marilyn Roper of Houlton loves reading to infants and toddlers, starting at four months, but she has a hard time finding enough books that are appropriate for this age group. The local library has responded by building a fine board book collection. The books requested by Marilyn have benefited the entire community, circulating constantly among parents and caregivers.
Adrien Deschenes spent several months reading exclusively from a giant treasury of illustrated fairy tales. He used these tales, many of which the children had never heard before, to inspire rich discussion and lead the group into related activities.
Indeed, most volunteers eschew the books that some might think would most effectively quell children’s wiggles and whisperings—what Joan Beckford calls “those crazy books with Hollywood movies or TV characters”—in favor of archetypal characters and classic themes, captivating language and high-quality illustrations. The stories they choose actually encourage wiggles and whisperings, which Born to Read volunteers recognize as signs of engaged imaginations and growing minds—symptoms of readers in the making.
But volunteer readers don’t stop at books. All volunteers learn finger plays and songs in their Born to Read training, and they trade activity ideas whenever they meet. Linden’s annual gardening project has become such a vital part of the Rubber Ducky Daycare year that one little boy starts inquiring about it in late February. Harrison Roper, former conductor of the Northern Maine Chamber Orchestra, leads children in music activities that help them learn about rhythm, sound, and rhyme—all important elements of reading.
Participating teachers and caregivers consistently report dramatic, positive changes in literacy skills (including attention span, book-handling, and vocabulary) as a result of these activities. To take just one example from a survey conducted this January, 78% of teachers around the state said that their Born to Read volunteer had made a “significant contribution” or “major contribution” to children’s increased interest in books and stories, while an additional 9% indicated that the volunteer was “totally responsible” for the increase.
Volunteers also have a considerable impact on the development of social and emotional intelligence, which current scientific research has revealed to be just as important for school readiness as cognitive achievement. Several teachers have said that all it takes to overcome the separation anxiety of a toddler is a reminder that after their parents leave, they’ll see their volunteer reader. Eighteen percent of teachers surveyed said that the volunteer was “totally responsible” for increased self-expression among children. As one elaborated, “I see children relating to the books. Children have come out and talked to me about things going on in their lives because they could relate to a story. It also helps them to ask questions to learn more about a topic of interest to them.”
But by far the most frequent observation made by teachers and caregivers concerns the connections forged across generations. Statistics released by the U.S. Census Bureau early this spring revealed that Maine has surpassed West Virginia as the oldest state in the nation, with a median age of 40.6 years. Many older residents—whether or not they’ve retired—are eager to stay active by volunteering. According to the U.S. Department of Labor Statistics, people 55 and older contribute about 7.5 billion volunteer hours each year. When these volunteers connect with young children, as they do in the Born to Read program, they are bridging a growing gap in our culture. “Mrs. Park brings us so much more than books,” says Leslie Szydlo of Jumping Jacks Day Care in Bangor. “In a world of hectic households and disjointed families, Mrs. Park is our extended family. She is a grandparent’s shoulder to lean on for the children, and a sounding board for desperate teachers. She is the source of grace and etiquette in a world of lost manners.”
For the volunteers themselves, lasting connections like these make the program worthwhile. The Ropers recognize the names of children they’ve worked with in their morning newspaper. When Roberta Carlstrom substitutes at her local elementary school, she is greeted with hugs from second- and third-graders who remember her as a reader from their preschool days. “I don’t know what I’ll do this summer,” laments Barbara Korn after her last visit to the Alphabet Preschool in Limerick. “I’ve seen the children change and grow just since I started reading last year. Trying to describe them is like trying to put your finger on mercury. I come out of there on Thursday afternoon thinking the world is a better place. You’d have to throw down a brick wall to keep me from coming back in September.”
If you are one of Maine’s many long-distance grandparents, or you simply want a weekly “kid fix,” please consider becoming a Born to Read volunteer. Contact Born to Read or your local RSVP office to get started.
