Mother Goose Works!

"I got a lot of great ideas from Mother Goose - I learned to read slower, take time and do more things with the book than just reading it."
- parent who attended a Mother Goose program at the Kane Family Center with two children.

Calendar




Find out when the next Mother Goose Program will be offered at your local Family Center in McKean County.

Featured Resource



Interested in finding out more about reading to your children? Check out the parents section of the Reading Is Fundamental website.

Mother Goose Programs

Reading + Talking + Exploring = Learning Experiences

That’s the formula Vermont Center for the Book used when creating the Mother Goose Programs in an attempt "to transform reading with preschool children into multidimensional and powerful learning experiences."1

This is done through showing parents useful techniques such as reading slower, asking open ended questions and doing activities that are connected to what was read to spur on discussion and learning ( view sample activity, .pdf); with the ultimate goal of helping the child become the storyteller. Essentially, the program shows parents techniques to make reading more interactive, fun and effective. When this is accomplished, a child is better equipped to learn at their full potential when entering school.

Mother Goose at the McKean County Family Centers

Getting kids ready for school is a particularly important factor in McKean County, where many preschoolers are entering kindergarten with weak literary skills, which means they are not ready to learn. In fact, McKean County was recently rated as a vulnerable county in a report published by the Office of Child Development and Early Learning. This means that the county both needs and would benefit most from early childhood investments.

The McKean County Family Centers are working on filling that need by offering Mother Goose Programs for parents with children primarily ages birth to five. A survey given to program participants shows that a difference is being made as parents report:

  • an increase in reading aloud to their children every day.
  • reading at their children’s pace.
  • using praise and encouragement while reading together.
  • asking open-ended questions.
1 Mother Goose Programs, “About Us”; available from www.mothergooseprograms.org/aboutus.php; Internet; accessed 6 June 2008.

The McKean County Family Centers is a program of The Guidance Center.