Reach Out and Read
Reach Out and Read (ROR) is a nonprofit organization that trains and supports medical providers to give books to children and advice parents about the importance of reading aloud at well-child exams. Nationwide, ROR serves 4 million children via 12,000 medical providers at nearly 5,000 program sites.
What Does ROR Do?
During regular pediatric checkups, Reach Out and Read pediatricians, family physicians, and nurse practitioners give new, developmentally appropriate books to children, ages 6 months through 5 years, and critical advice to parents about the importance of reading aloud.
Reach Out and Read AI/AN program sites serve more than 60,000 AI/AN children and families at 215 IHS and ‘638 clinics nationwide. Nearly 700 doctors and nurses provide more than 120,000 books to AI/AN children and their families each year.
Why Is ROR Different?
The first five years of life offer a critical window for learning, with rapid brain development that does not occur at any other time. Many children, especially from low-income AI/AN families on reservations, are not read to from birth. Children who grow up without sufficient exposure to language arrive at school without basic literacy skills, and often struggle with reading in early grades.
As a group, AI/AN children have the poorest test scores, lowest high school graduation rates, and worst college entry/graduation rates of any minority group in the United States, making early education and early literacy programs like Reach Out and Read critical.
14 nationally-peer reviewed studies show that families served by Reach Out and Read read together more often, their children enter kindergarten with larger vocabularies and stronger language skills and the children are better prepared to achieve their potential. Research shows that children who start school on track are more likely to reach their full educational, social, and life potential.
How Can I Participate at ROR at Sage Memorial Hospital?
From the ages of 6-months to 5-years old, a child brought to Sage Memorial Hospital for a Well Child visit at the Outpatient clinic will receive an age-appropriate book free of charge.