English Reach Out and Read is an evidence based program where doctors and health professionals "prescribe" reading to children and their families at the well-child checks.
Brain science tells us that the brain grows the most rapidly during the first five years of life. The child’s experiences - good or otherwise - affects how the brain develops. Research also tells us that positive and responsive parenting during the early years creates strong parent-child bonds that encourage healthy brain development.
Reach Out and Read is an evidence based program where doctors and health professionals "prescribe" reading to children and their families at the well-child checks. This allows the child over the course of time to be able to build a library of their own.
During the visit the physician will:
Talk
Talk with parents about how important it is to read aloud and engage with their young children.
Demonstrate
Demonstrate how best to look at books and talk about the stories with their infants, toddlers and preschoolers.
Encourage
Encourage them to cuddle up and read together at home and build routines around books.
Give
And then give a new book to the child to take home and keep.
At the end of the program, every child has a home-library of books, each given with the advice to parents that they are their child's first and most important teacher.
Participating Clinics
- Childhood Health Associates of Salem
- Willamette Family Medical Center
- Grand Ronde Health and Wellness Clinic
- Woodburn Pediatric Clinic
- Salem Pediatric Clinic
- Legacy Health (formerly Silverton Health) - Keizer Health Center
- Santiam Hospital. Includes these three clinics: Aumsville Medical Clinic, Sublimity Medical Clinic, Santiam Medical Clinic
- Salud Medical Center / Yakima Valley Farm Workers Clinics
- Lancaster Family Health Center
