By Jeanette Seah
Today, we live in an increasingly digitalised world where children are more familiar with smartphones or tablets than physical books. While mobile applications can support our children as they learn to read, nothing can replace the benefits of a shared reading experience with children.
Hence, St. James’ Church Kindergarten (Leedon) started a Parent Library Programme in Term 2 this year where we invited special guests who joined our Nursery, K1 and K2 children in class – our Library Mums and Dads!
Every Friday, these Library Mums and Dads took turns becoming our very own librarians, facilitate the borrowing and returning of books for the children. During the last two weeks of the term, these versatile librarians also transformed into storytellers! They took the children on different storytelling adventures as they explored wonderful worlds as a community of readers.
Inculcating a love for reading
As part of our Parent Library Programme, each child takes home a new book of their choice to read with their family over the weekend. This inculcates a love for reading and good reading habits in the children from a young age. We encourage parents to model good reading habits by sharing with their child about their own favourite childhood books and what these stories meant to them.
We also encourage parents to take their time to read the books together with their child, asking questions or making comments about the story. This two-way interaction between parent and child helps improve the children’s language and literacy skills.
On one occasion, a child from a non-Chinese speaking household selected a Chinese storybook from the library. After the weekend, her parent shared with us that although neither parent was able to read the Chinese words, they came up with an extremely creative solution. They used the illustrations in the book (and their imagination!) to create their own narrative and storyline.
They shared that this allowed them to create different stories each time they read the book together. What a great way to demonstrate creative problem-solving! Asking your child questions about what is happening in the story and the decisions the characters are making not only allows your child the opportunity to verbalise and share their thoughts, but also allows them to develop a deeper understanding of the concepts in the story and connect their own prior knowledge with what in occurring in the book.
Building strong partnerships with parents
At SJCK (Leedon), we believe that each child has their own wealth of personal experiences and abilities. Thus, building strong partnerships with each family is critical in recognising each child’s individual differences and building on their strengths. It is only when we come together in a loving and supportive community that celebrates each child’s successes that we can support each of their individual learning journeys.
We highly value and appreciate the partnerships we have cultivated with our parents. We believe these positive relationships between the school, family, and children enable us to have open communication as we work together towards our common goal – To help the child grow into their God-given identity.
Our Parent Library Programme allows us to provide parents the meaningful and regular opportunities to be involved in their children’s’ preschool lives. It allows them to partner with us to enhance their child’s preschool experiences and enhances our school community beyond just the teachers and children but to include the parents as well.
One of our Library Dads, Hong Yee Wei said: “I am happy to be involved and have the opportunity to interact with the little friends and serve them!”
Nicky Tay, one of our Library Mum’s also shared: “It’s a fun way to interact with the children in their school environment. When my eldest was in school it was during Covid, so we did not have the opportunity to do this. I really enjoy being able to now!”
We have also seen how excited the children are to have some of their parents join them in the classroom. As the weeks passed, we heard them asking some of the Library Mums and Dads when they were coming to school again. Some children even took the initiative to help their parents when they were on duty!
Thank you, parents, for your willingness to partner with us in different ways to enrich the children’s learning experience in school!
To find out more about our preschools, visit https://www.anglicanps.edu.sg
Jeanette Seah is the principal of St. James’ Church Kindergarten (Leedon)
