The best part of Angela Sears Spittal’s week is the half-hour she spends reading storybooks to a classroom of 4- and 5-year-olds. Although she’s the executive director of Ready Readers, the St. Louis nonprofit that sends volunteers into 250 classrooms a week for storytime, she’s dedicated to participating as a volunteer reader herself.
“There’s nothing like the excitement of a preschool classroom when they see their reader coming in with a bag full of books and they know they’re going to have a fun, engaging time,” she says. “You feel like a rock star when you walk in.”
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Ready Readers is celebrating 25 years of bringing books and the joy of reading into the classrooms of low-income, under-resourced children. The program currently serves over 12,000 children a week, all located in economically disadvantaged communities. They aim to increase literacy equity among the early childhood age group, where research shows reading proficiency begins.
According to one study, children who are read to at least three times a week are almost twice as likely to score in the top 25 percent in reading compared to children who are read to less than three times a week. Reading aloud to young children is considered so critical to early childhood development that the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that doctors prescribe reading activities to parents at check-ups.
The program pairs volunteers with the same classroom for an entire year. The readers come weekly for interactive storytime and are encouraged to make it as fun as possible for the kids, using songs, repetition, or even props like puppets. And seven to eight times a year, they give each child a copy of the book they’ve read to take home and keep. This is important because according to research cited by the childhood literacy advocacy group Ferst Readers, one of the only behavioral measures that correlates significantly with reading scores is the number of books in the home. Ready Readers isn’t just helping kids get excited about reading at school—they also support parental efforts at home.
Volunteers are the lifeblood of this agency, but the pandemic dealt a blow to the number of weekly volunteer readers. Before COVID-19, Sears Spittal reports they had 400 weekly storytime readers, with a 93 percent retention rate. Now, they are down to 225, but hoping to expand to more classrooms after they refresh their volunteer ranks.
In April, Ready Readers will celebrate a milestone: 1 million books given to St. Louis children over 25 years. To mark the occasion, they’ve chosen a special book to give out: Cannon’s Crash Course, written by local author Mon Trice and illustrated by local artist Cbabi Bayoc. It’s a lively and touching story of a young boy’s adventures in learning to ride a bike.
“We serve low-income communities and because of systemic racism, that means we predominantly serve children of color. About 80 percent of the children we serve are African-American,” says Sears Spittal. “So we work really hard to make sure we are giving kids books like this one, where they can see themselves represented and identify with the main character,” she says.
The book’s author, St. Louisan Mon Trice, says she wrote Cannon’s Crash Course largely for this reason. “When kids, especially young black boys, can see themselves reflected in a book, it engages them at a whole new level,” Trice says.
If you walk in one of 20 area parks in April and May, you may notice one of Ready Readers Storybook Walks. A Storybook Walk is an interactive way to inspire kids to read outside of the classroom. Each page of Cannon’s Crash Course will be printed on a yard sign and placed in order along park walking paths, so kids and families can read while enjoying the outdoors.
Ready Readers will be hosting a block party on June 4 at Bella Fontaine park to mark the million-book achievement. The event will focus on literacy, with book giveaways, read-alouds, free food, and hands-on activities for kids.
If you’d like to learn more about the organization, see the Ready Readers website.
