1,000 Books Before Kindergarten

What Is It?

1,000 Books Before Kindergarten is a new program at our library that promotes reading to newborns, infants and toddlers.  It encourages parent/caregiver and child bonding through reading.  While 1,000 books may seem like a lot, remember reading just one book to your child a night for a year is already 365 and reading three books a day is 1,095 in a year! Don’t forget that repeats count, so if your child has a favorite book that you read together over and over, each time you read it, it counts!

Why Is It Important?

Reading 1,000 books to a child before kindergarten significantly benefits their early development by fostering a love of reading, building strong language skills, enhancing vocabulary, improving cognitive abilities, and creating a strong bond between parent and child, ultimately setting them up for success in school and beyond; essentially giving them a head start on their education by exposing them to a wide range of words and concepts early on. 

Help Your Child Earn Prizes!

We offer incentives to children who reach certain reading milestones.  For every 100 books read and recorded the child will receive a prize.  To claim your prizes, just visit our library and show your child’s completed reading logs to library staff member.

Once You Reach 1,000 Books…

Your child will win a custom t-shirt that they can wear to show off their accomplishment, a certificate of achievement along with their photo being added to our Reading Hall of Fame display!

How To Get Started:

Come stop by the Sugar-Salem Community Library to sign up and get your official welcome packet! You can then choose to use a paper reading log to track your books OR download the 1000 Books By Kindergarten app for IOS or Android.