What a difference a dad’s read-alouds can make

Surrounded by stacks of picture books with such titles as When Dad’s at Sea, Tell Me One Thing, Dad and Daddy is a Doodlebug, participants earlier this week in the Dads and Early Literacy Workshop in Slayton, Minnesota, were left with no doubt as to the day’s focus. “If parents—especially fathers—read to their preschool children, it really shows and makes a positive difference when those kids arrive at school,” said Tom Fitzpatrick, the workshop’s leader and a program director of the Minnesota Humanities Center, based in St. Paul.

Fitzpatrick offered a few startling statistics to the group of Early Childhood Family Education directors, probation officers and Head Start workers. “One study shows that fully 40% of dads never read to their kids,” Fitzpatrick said. “Only 25% of fathers living in the same home with their children ages 0 to 4 read to them daily.” However, the payoff when fathers do make the time to read with their kids is enormous. Read the article in The Daily Globe.