Interview with Author Jean Ciborowski Fahey
Jean Ciborowski Fahey has written two children's books: "Make Time for Reading: A Story Guide for Parents with Babies and Young Children" and "I'll Build You a Bookcase." Below is an interview with her focusing on her inspiration and goals for her books
1: What experiences do you have working in early childhood education and related fields?
Not long after completing my Masters Degree in Special Education and my PhD, I became a member of the Boston Children’s Hospital School Function multidisciplinary preschool assessment team. We assessed young children at risk for reading and other learning problems and made recommendations for intervention. After 15 years of clinical work, I wanted a better understanding of how the brain gets wired for learning to read. The brain science was pointing to the building blocks for reading forming as early as infancy. Therefore, if we want to reduce the increasingly high number of children struggling to learn-to-read, we could not wait until children reached school age; we had to enroll parents and caregivers in building the foundation for reading as soon as babies came home from the birthing hospital.
Guided by the early literacy science, I taught in Lesley University’s graduate Language and Literacy program, became the Early Literacy Research Consultant at Reach Out and Read’s national office, consulted with the Massachusetts Department of Education’s Massachusetts Family Literacy Consortium (MFLC) and co-founded the South Shore Hospital Reading Partnership. For 17 years at South Shore, I delivered a course for expectant and new parents called “The Journey To Literacy Begins at Birth.” As a parent and teacher educator, I also provided the course to programs in early education, home visiting, Adult Basic Education, libraries and even local Rotaries.
2: What were some of your favorite picture books as a child, and which ones do you enjoy reading to children today?
My childhood took place in the fifties where I recall a few books of fairy tales and nursery rhymes with vivid illustrations. By the time I had my own child however, I was deep into the field of reading and created a good size home library of rhyming books with rich language and illustrations. As a toddler, my daughter enjoyed every book Dori Chiconas and Mem Fox wrote; as a preschooler she surprised me with an interest in E.B White’s chapter books and books without words. Now that she's a mother with children of her own, my favorites to read to them include Mama, Do You Love Me? by Barbara Joose; The Velveteen Rabbit by Margaret Williams Bianco; any book written and illustrated by Jan Brett and Dr. Seuss. (And my 3 personal 2 favorites- Wolf in the Snow by Matthew Cordell, Animals Animals by Eric Carle and Owl Moon by Jane Yolen).
3: What inspired you to write the books “Make Time for Reading: A Story Guide for Parents of Babies and Young Children” and “I’ll Build You a Bookcase?”
I got inspired by all the children getting left out of the joy of reading ……..
Most children’s journey to reading proficiency takes about 9 years. By third grade (or by age 9 or 10), good readers make the transition from “learning-to-read” to “reading-to-learn.” Referred to by reading researcher Keith Stanovitch as The Matthew Effect, the phrase comes from a paraphrase of the Gospel of Matthew: “The rich get richer and the poor get poorer.” That is to say, the more children read the better they read. As a result, their worlds expand, and indeed for the children who love to read … life becomes extraordinarily altered.
Yet for too many of our nation’s children, learning to read is difficult. Only 35% of our nation’s 4th graders are proficient readers and low-income children are disproportionately numbered among poor readers.
Students who reach 4th grade without being able to transition from learning-to-read, to reading-to-learn will struggle with social studies, history and science textbooks. This makes them less likely to graduate from high school on time, reducing their earning potential and competitive edge in a global economy. This also impacts their social and emotional development.
We now know a major culprit for low 3rd/4th grade reading levels is that too many children enter kindergarten without enough of the foundational experiences for learning-to-read. They fall behind in first and second grade and rarely catch up to their peers who have already learned to read for information, comfort and enjoyment. We cannot wait until children enter kindergarten and hope for the best. Parents and early caregivers are the strongest tools in the tool box for setting children up for reading success.
Make Time for Reading (birth to 5)
I wanted to innovate the way we talked with parents and caregivers about how to build a foundation for reading. My idea was to create a “once upon a time” bedtime story to teach parents how to put their babies on the path toward reading success. I was especially interested in reaching parents who were learning to read and, or learning English. I wrote and self-published Make Time for Reading: a story guide for parents of babies and young children. I raised money on a crowd-funding platform for a book publishing campaign, hired an Illustrator (Peter J. Thornton), a book designer, and a printer. I turned what I knew about early literacy development into a rhymed story about how one little girl learns to read. As parents read and reread the story, they discover how beginning in infancy- back-and-forth conversations, reading aloud and often, and playing word and singing games are powerful ways to put babies and toddlers on the path toward reading success. 21,000 story-guides are in the hands of families with young children - most of them donated by generous funders - to programs that work with some of our most vulnerable families with young children.
In 2016, I received a grant from the non-profit Mass Literacy to publish Make Time for Reading in a bilingual English/Spanish edition. Subsequently, Toyota gave me a $20,000 “Teacher of the Year” award to increase access to more parents and publish an English Portuguese bilingual edition of Make Time for Reading.
I’ll Build You a Bookcase (birth to 3)
In 2019, I entered an international children’s story contest sponsored by the William Penn Foundation and OpenIDEO, an innovative design think tank. The challenge was to write a 250-word story for babies and young toddlers while imbedding parent messages that show how to help children navigate the journey toward literacy. Having written my first book (Make Time for Reading), I was more than ready for the challenge. Among 500 entries from several continents, my story, I’ll Build You a Bookcase won the $20,000, 1st prize and a publishing contract with Lee and Low Books in New York City – the country’s largest multicultural publisher. The publisher hired award winning Simone Shin, to illustrate the diversity in families and young children.
When the William Penn Foundation purchased 25,000 copies in English and bilingual Spanish, Vietnamese, Arabic and Mandarin to donate to families, I had a new way to reach more families and I was thrilled. To date, 52,000 copies of ‘Bookcase’ have reached families- nearly half donated.
According to Elliot Weinbaum, Chief Philanthropy Officer at the William Penn Foundation:
“Talking and reading with children is how we lay the groundwork for strong readers in the future, even when it seems like they are too young to understand. This book seeks to engage children with its emotionally resonant writing and storyline, while giving ideas to adults about how to support early language development. We are eager to share ‘I’ll Build You a Bookcase’ with Philadelphia families, and we hope to see this book reach families around the country.”
4: What are your goals for the books, and what types of collaborations would you like to pursue to maximize their impact?
GOAL 1: to begin the conversations about learning to read with more parents-to-be and parents of babies and young toddlers
When we start reading to our babies as soon as we bring them home from the birthing hospital, we stimulate the brain while it is most malleable. Further, the bonding and language benefits from reading to our children can be profound.
Goal 2: to reach more parents who are learning to read and speak English as well as the people who work with them
Reading stories in the child’s home language can provide wonderful bonding benefits for both babies and parents. It makes sense then that baby books include the rhythm, repetition, and rhyme of the language spoken by the important people in the baby’s life. And because neural pathways in the baby brain form and strengthen through repetition, the more we read to babies and young toddlers the more we prepare them for learning-to-read
Collaborations
I am looking for nonprofits and for profits interested in expanding their own mission to improve the quality of life for their constituents of families with young children.
By purchasing and donating Make Time for Reading story-guides to families through for example, places of business, birthing hospitals, and programs in early education and care, home visiting, early intervention, libraries and Adult Basic Education more children will arrive in kindergarten better prepared to learn-to-read.
In exchange for funding a dedicated print run is a branding opportunity - on the inside cover of the story-guide. (e.g., “this edition was made possible through the generous contribution of ……..”)
5: What do you wish the general public and policymakers understood more about early childhood literacy development?
The national literacy data shows the language and literacy gap between poor and non-poor children begins in infancy and widens significantly by kindergarten. This causes many children to fall behind in learning to read, from which they seldom catch up. THE JOURNEY TO LITERACY BEGINS AT BIRTH!
Innovative solutions – start reading at birth. Exciting new neuroimaging techniques reveal the parts of the brain that grow and develop in language and literacy-rich environments. Reading especially arouses the baby brain and in a very particular region. It is in this area that the brain analyzes and stores the parts and patterns of the language of the home. Frequent reading, rhyming and word play builds the foundational experiences for learning to read! READING CAN BE FUN AND BENEFICIAL.
The more we read to young children before they can talk and walk, the more language they will hear. Hearing more language means learning more words. And learning more words before one can read will help children once they begin to read. FREQUENCY MATTERS.
*(e.g., beginning in infancy- back-and-forth conversations, every day reading aloud, playing word and singing games, use of the library, etc.)
PLEASE CONTACT ME FOR PRICING, BRANDING, BOOK SIGNING OR PRESENTATIONS.
JEAN CIBOROWSKI FAHEY. PHD
508- 2747603