REACH OUT AND READ RHODE ISLAND

On an annual basis, Reach Out and Read Rhode Island aims to maintain our partnerships with almost 70 healthcare sites where we assure that almost 400 pediatric medical providers are trained to reach 40,000 children and provide more than 80,000 new books at no cost to Rhode Island families. New in 2018, we began providing books in five languages to better serve the needs of our diverse families. And in 2019, we expanded our program to include newborns through five-month-old children.

RORRI-trained medical providers guide families during every well-visit from the newborn visit – five years old, coaching families about the importance of reading aloud daily with their infants, toddlers, and preschoolers. Concurrently, these providers give each child a new developmentally-appropriate and language -appropriate book at each visit; children start kindergarten with 14 RORRI books in their home library and families receive the consistent message about the importance of reading aloud daily from their pediatric provider. Medical providers’ simple and effective guidance for positive, responsive parenting during the early years fosters nurturing parent-child bonds that promote cognitive stimulation and social connections from shared reading. Together, this guidance and bonding impact outcomes including emergent language skills and increased brain development, and provide a foundation for academic and lifelong success. The earliest years are a critical window of opportunity with rapid brain development that is unparalleled in other life stages.

Reading aloud every day with their young children can empower caregivers to make a lifelong positive impact on children’s health and future. Families who develop the habit of reading together can build a loving interaction into their daily lives that can nurture relationships and promote brain development, early literacy, and language development.

Reach Out and Read RI intervenes early and implements the following model at all partnering healthcare sites:
Medical providers are trained:
• Rhode Island medical residents are trained at Kent County Family Medicine and Hasbro Children’s Hospital
• RORRI is incorporated into a medical practice: doctors, nurses, and other medical and administrative staff complete a CME-accredited online training

RORRI is integrated into pediatric care. Trained Reach Out and Read medical providers:
• Tailor the program to the needs of their patient population
• Educate parents/caregivers that they are their child's first and most important teacher and how important it is to read aloud and engage with their young children every day
• Demonstrate how best to look at books and talk about the stories with their infants, toddlers, and preschoolers
• Encourage families to build routines around cuddling up and reading together to create the social bonds that support healthy brain development
• Provide a new book to the child to take home and keep—at no cost to the family—at every well-visit.

Established in 1999, RORRI partners with 67 hospitals, clinics, practices, and community health centers statewide where 379 pediatric medical providers reach more than 40,000 children and provide 80,000 new books at no cost to Rhode Island families annually. As more than 95% of a child's brain is formed during the first six years of life, Reach Out and Read RI’s medical community has the greatest access to young children and their families when it counts the most. Our approach to early literacy capitalizes on these partnerships and the unique trust between parents and their pediatrician to set children on a path for success from the earliest possible age.

What distinguishes RORRI from other early childhood intervention programs is our partnerships with these 67 healthcare sites statewide, giving us unparalleled access to children. With more than 98% of RI children insured, young children are likely to attend their well-visits with their pediatrician or family physician, providing a critical opportunity for RORRI providers to integrate literacy guidance into regular checkups. RORRI is the only early-literacy program offered in pediatric/family practices for newborns through five-year-old children, totaling 14 well-child visits that include family interactions with a medical provider regarding the importance of shared daily reading.

The body of independent, peer-reviewed, and published research supporting the efficacy of the Reach Out and Read model is more extensive than for any other psychosocial intervention in general pediatrics. This research shows that when the model is implemented with fidelity, ROR parents are up to four times more likely to read aloud to their children and children have higher receptive and expressive language scores, and in turn show a 3-6 month developmental edge over their peers.

The majority of partnering RORRI healthcare sites joined the program more than 10 years ago, demonstrating the development of long-term sustainable relationships with healthcare sites and medical providers which benefits families and their children.

Reach Out and Read Rhode Island is a dynamic organization with 67 partnering health centers, clinics, hospitals, and practices statewide, where we reach 40,000 children under age six annually. Because RORRI works in the existing healthcare system with medical providers who incorporate our program into each pediatric well-child visit, the program is cost-efficient, sustainable, and highly scalable. Since our founding in 1999, we have provided more than 1,000,000 new books to Rhode Island children at no cost to families.

We encourage parents and caregivers to read aloud daily to their infants, toddlers, and preschoolers as a simple and effective way of fostering nurturing relationships and developing language and emergent literacy. This positive, responsive parenting during the early years creates strong parent-child bonds that promote healthy brain development and help provide a foundation for lifelong success. With RORRI now beginning at birth, children graduate from the program at age five, having received care during 14 well-visits where they were provided 14 RORRI books for their home library. This access to books reinforces the joyful value of reading and develops a lifelong habit and love for reading.

Research shows that investments in early childhood education, including Reach Out and Read (recommended by the American Academy of Pediatrics as an essential part of pediatric care), are effective in helping children build reading skills by teaching parents simple routines that can better prepare their children for school. Peer-reviewed research shows that families who are part of Reach Out and Read are 2.5x more likely to read to their children and children's pre-school language development is improved by 3-6 months. Reach Out and Read Rhode Island transforms the lives of children by empowering parents and caregivers to embrace their role as their child’s first and most important teacher.

Our model and mission are anchored in supporting pediatric clinicians to help families use books to develop relationships through stories and language-rich interactions. Due to the coronavirus crisis, RORRI staff called all RORRI healthcare sites this spring to ask how we could best help them through this crisis. Pediatric providers reported that there is an urgent need to provide their young patients with developmentally-appropriate books about social-emotional health. Additionally, with civil unrest sweeping the country and Rhode Island, developmentally-appropriate books addressing diversity can help families have on-going conversations about race, racism, and inclusion. Families and children benefit from being provided diversity and inclusion books that help discuss challenging topics, and that also give children the opportunity to see themselves in books enjoying joyful activities such as cooking rice, writing poems, and making friends.