Early Literacy

Miss Alyisha and the Ames Free Library celebrate National Correspondence Month with this very special Storytime! Miss Alyisha is joined by JK Growling and a host of animal friends as they read letters, sing songs, and read Eoin McLaughlin and Polly Dunbar's While We Can't Hug. This book is published by and read with permission from Faber Children's Books.

Pajama storytime is fun for the whole family! We'll share books, rhymes, & songs to help wind down your evening. This storytime is designed to engage children of various ages. Pajamas are encouraged, but not required.

Listen to Miss Jess share Hanukkah and Christmas books during these holiday storytimes!

These prerecorded storytimes can be viewed at your convenience, December 1 - 31, 2020!

To see ALL of our storytimes, visit our Storytimes playlist on our YouTube page!

If you haven’t caught an episode of S’more Stories with Miss Alyisha yet – tune in today! There’s a new episode every Friday, but you can catch them any day online under the Storytimes & Events column at https://amesfreelibrary.org/kids-homepage. 

Starting Friday, October 2, 2020, tune in for Miss Alyisha's gently creepy Fall storytimes! These storytimes are perfect for preschool and early elementary-aged children.

Check here each week in October to hear about ghosts, mummies, and more!

Then pick up a pre-bagged, themed craft in the Children's Room, while supplies last (you'll find us on the middle floor of the Library).

Questions? Email kids@amesfreelibrary.org.

School has finally started – congratulations and good luck to all our brand new Kindergartners! 

For those of you whose little ones haven’t yet started Kindergarten, there’s still time to read 1,000 Books Before Kindergarten! It sounds like a challenge, but reading 1,000 books is easier than you might think!

Throughout the summer, we have discussed different areas of building early literacy knowledge for babies and toddlers, and we shared ideas of how you can do that.

When it comes to encouraging literacy skills, outdoor play is just as important for babies and little ones as indoor book- and toy-based play. When we think “early literacy,” we think of books, and storytime, and of sitting to either read or listen. We think of looking at pictures and telling stories with objects representative of the story’s objects (for example, a red ball as Snow White’s apple). What we don’t often think about are large (gross) motor skills and their part in literacy development. 

Regardless of whether today’s kids will learn to print, write cursive, or type on a keyboard or screen – they’ll need to have strong fine motor skills. There are so many fun ways to build your child’s hand strength and coordination! At the library, we use Busy Boxes after storytimes with preschool-aged children; you can recreate these activities at home. Some of our boxes include:

Lacing Cards

Reading and vocabulary go hand in hand – one can improve the other, and vice versa. How fortunate that reading and talking to your baby is so easy! Little ones learn words at an amazing rate. The more words he learns now, the more he will be able to express and understand (spoken and written) later in life.