Louisiana Cultural Vistas - Spring 2008 - (Page 6) National Prime Time expansion targets Spanish-speaking families PRIME TIME Inc., an affiliate of the LEH, in cooperation with the American Library Association Public Programs Office, will target Spanishspeaking families in Florida, Michigan, New Jersey, Oklahoma and New York to participate in the national expansion of the LEH's award-winning family reading and discussion program, PRIME TIME FAMILY READING TIME®. This national expansion is made possible through a $275,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, which also supported earlier grants for implementation in Louisiana and initial national expansion. In New Jersey, the state library will direct the partnership with the public libraries. In Florida and Michigan, the Florida Humanities Council and the Michigan Humanities Council will direct the partnership with public libraries. The Pioneer Public Library System in Oklahoma will direct the project with their branch libraries, and in New York, the Queens Borough Public Library will direct the partnership with their branch libraries. The selected states will receive grant funding and support materials to present the PRIME TIME series at four sites, and selected library systems will receive support to present PRIME TIME at three branch locations. Each series will meet once a week for six weeks at participating libraries. Through a discussion leader and a storyteller, children ages six to ten years and their parents or guardians will hear classic children's stories; watch reading aloud demonstrations; discuss humanities themes in each book and learn about library resources and services. At each site, bilingual programs will be offered to serve Spanish-speaking children and their families. Younger siblings, ages three to five years, will participate in separate pre-reading activities. Based on illustrated children's books, PRIME TIME is designed to help low-income, low-literate families, including English language learners, bond around the act of reading and talking about books. It models and encourages family reading and discussion of humanities topics, and aids parents and children in selecting books and becoming active public library users. PRIME TIME received the 2003 Advancement of Literacy award from the Public Library Association, a division of the American Library Association, and in 2000 the “Coming Up Taller” award from the President's Committee on the Arts and the Humanities. PRIME TIME, based on a successful series of the same name created by the LEH in 1991 at the East Baton Rouge Parish Library, has spread nationwide with funding from NEH. Over 24,000 individuals have participated in more than 750 PRIME TIME programs in 36 states and the Virgin Islands. For more information about PRIME TIME, please visit www.leh.org or contact Faye Flanagan at (504) 620-2485. 6 LOUISIANA ENDOWMENT FOR THE HUMANITIES\Spring 2008 http://www.leh.org http://www.leh.org http://www.lsu.edu/lsupress
For optimal viewing of this digital publication, please enable JavaScript and then refresh the page. If you would like to try to load the digital publication without using Flash Player detection, please click here.