Scientists Discover that Learning to Read Can Physically Alter the Brain

from the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, Wednesday, December 9, 2009

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/breaking/s_656950.html

Two Carnegie Mellon University scientists have uncovered the first evidence that intensive instruction to improve reading skills in young children causes the brain to physically rewire itself.

This instruction causes the brain to create new white matter that improves communication with the brain, CMU researchers Timothy Keller and Marcel Just reported today in the journal Neuron.

These findings could result in new strategies in the treatment of mental disorders, including autism, scientists said.

Keller and Just found that brain imaging of children between the ages of 8 and 10 showed that the quality of white matter — the brain tissue that carries signals between areas of gray matter where information is processed — improved substantially after children received 100 hours of remedial training.

After the training, imaging showed that the capability of the white matter to transmit signals efficiently had increased, and testing showed the children could read better.

“We’re excited about these results,” Just said in a statement. “The indication that behavioral intervention can improve both cognitive performance and the microstructure of white matter tracts is a breakthrough for treating and understanding development problems.”

The research was funded by grants from the Richard King Mellon Foundation and the National Institute of Mental Health.

“The exciting breakthrough here is detecting changes in brain connectivity with behavioral treatment. This finding with reading deficits suggests an exciting new approach to be tested in the treatment of mental disorders, which increasingly appear to be due to problems in specific brain circuits,” said Dr. Thomas R. Insel, director of the National Institute of Mental Health.

Why Read Aloud to Children?

from the Family Literacy Foundation

Why Read Aloud with Children?

• Studies prove that the most important thing adults can do in preparing young children for success in school and reading is to read aloud with them.
• Many doctors believe that a child that has never had the experience of being read to is not a fully healthy child. The American Medical Association has suggested that all doctors prescribe “reading to children”.
• Reading aloud with children regularly is an extremely effective medium to build relationships and communicate with children.

The Many Benefits of Reading Aloud with Children: 

• Children’s self-esteem grows as they experience the security of having a parent or other caring person read aloud with them.

• Children experience increased communication with parents and other family members.

• Children are introduced to new concepts such as colors, shapes, numbers, and alphabet, in a fun, age appropriate way.

• Children build listening skills, vocabulary, memory and language skills.

• Children develop imagination and creativity.

• Children learn information about the world around them.

• Children develop individual interests in special subjects like dinosaurs, cats, or cars.

• Children learn positive behavior patterns and social values.

• Children learn positive attitudes towards themselves and others.

• CHILDREN LEARN THE JOY OF READING!

A Thanksgiving Prayer from Marian Wright Edelman

Marian Wright Edelman is President of the Children’s Defense Fund whose Leave No Child Behind^® mission is to ensure every child a Healthy Start, a Head Start, a Fair Start, a Safe Start and a Moral Start in life and successful passage to adulthood with the help of caring families and communities. This is a reprint of Ms. Edelman’s most recent “Child Watch” column:

http://cdf.childrensdefense.org/site/MessageViewer?em_id=19021.0&dlv_id=19281

A Thanksgiving Prayer to End Poverty in Our Time

Thanksgiving is a time when many Americans pause to be grateful for all we have. In the current economic downturn when the gap between rich and poor is at the highest level since the Great Depression and the unemployment rate is 10.2 percent, millions of our neighbors, including many families with children, are struggling hard to count their blessings. The latest Census Bureau numbers show the number of children living in poverty ($22,050 for a family of four) increased by almost 750,000 in 2008 to 14.1 million; the number of children living in extreme poverty ($11,025 for a family of four) increased by more than 500,000 to 6.3 million children. This is the biggest child poverty increase since 1992 and it comes at a time when our national safety net is full of holes. When parents lose their jobs, lose their homes, lose their health care, children suffer, and all of us lose. Each year we keep 14.1 million children in poverty it costs our nation over half a trillion dollars in lost productivity, higher crime, and poorer health.

What kind of nation, blessed to be the wealthiest in the world, lets 1 in 5 children be poor with its children the poorest age group among us? This indefensible and preventable child poverty reflects a spiritual and values poverty far deeper than the eye can see and threatens the very meaning and future of America. So I offer a Thanksgiving prayer for us to commit to end poverty in our time — beginning with children.

God help us to end poverty in our time.

The poverty of having a child with too little to eat and no place to sleep, no air, sunlight and space in which to breathe, bask, and grow.

The poverty of watching your child suffer and get sicker and sicker and not knowing what to do or how to get help because you don’t have a car to get to the emergency room or health insurance.

This just in from the National Association of Counties…

The “Alameda County Library “Start with a Story” Project was recently awarded a 2009 Achievement Award for Model Programs from the National Association of Counties (NACo). Below is an article from the National Association of Counties’ County Newsletter:

‘Start with a Story’ Program Promotes Literacy for Inmates’ Families

By Dan Miller
SPECIAL TO COUNTY NEWS

 With little more than a book and a friendly face, Alameda County, Calif. has turned a potentially emotionally draining weekly ritual into a bright spot for dozens of children.

The Alameda County Library’s Start with a Story program supplies books to children waiting in line to visit incarcerated relatives. Now, instead of idly waiting for their turn at the jail, volunteers provide kids with free books and, if they request it, help reading them.

Lisa Harris, program manager for the county’s library system, hatched the idea for Start with a Story while working at a local jail facility to provide adult literacy services to the inmates. After seeing large crowds of kids waiting to see their parents or relatives, Harris took the initiative to go out to the jail one Saturday morning with a table and a selection of books.

“We had tons of kids who wanted to participate and were thrilled that they were able to get a book,” Harris said. “It sort of snowballed from there.”

Our new favorite blog: “Getting Boys to Read”

An interesting site to connect boys and books…

http://www.gettingboystoread.com/

If you find the suggestions on this site useful, please let us know!!

Dear Mr. President

On Saturday and Sunday, September 12 and 13, Start with a Story participants will have an opportunity to write a letter to President Obama.

In celebration of International Literacy Day, and as a kick-off to the Start with a Story Project’s Family Literacy Art Days, children visiting a the project table at Santa Rita Jail or Glenn Dyer Jail will have an opportunity to write a letter to President Obama about, well, anything!

Children can draw a picture, and tell how much they enjoy participating in Start with a Story, and how important it is to them. They can write about  the new school year, or any other subject they like.

All letters will be collected and mailed to the White House by Alameda County library staff.

The White House responds to every letter written to the President, and 
sometimes the President himself responds directly.  We expect that the library and the Start with a Story Project will receive a letter with the presidential seal expressing gratitude for participation and interest in our country and its government, and possibly will receive a letter from the President himself that we will distribute to Start with a Story participants as a reminder to the children and the community of the interest the government takes in all of us.

Art supplies and kids to use ‘em will abound on September 12 and 13 - all we need is you!

If you would like to participate, please contact Raul Rodriguez at rrodriguez@aclibrary.org; (510) 745-1486.

Read for Change

In support of United We Serve, a national effort launched by President Obama to engage more Americans in serving their communities this summer, Reading is Fundamental (RIF)  invites you to READ FOR CHANGE.

Help us collectively log 3 million minutes of reading with children to help us raise awareness about the impact of children’s literacy on the long-term economic impact of the country. The challenge will culminate on September 11 – National Day of Service and Remembrance.

Start reading with kids today! Log your minutes at http://www.rif.org/readforchange/

A Story We Loved: “Heartbreaking art helps kids with inmate parents”

By Dana Rosenblatt
CNN

http://www.cnn.com/2009/LIVING/07/27/bia.children.of.inmates/index.html

HOUSTON, Texas (CNN) — The drawings are macabre, especially because they’re created by children: stick figures writhing in pain and confusion, a knife dripping with blood and a broken heart.

Child counselors say that for kids, art therapy can be more effective than traditional therapy.

Next to the heart, the child artist has written: ‘My heart is bleeding, my heart is a broken bleeding heart.” Another child has drawn a red bubble, inside of which is written: “I want 2 die.”

All of these young artists — members of a program called No More Victims — have at least one parent who has served time in prison.

The powerful drawings communicate their experiences with pain, hopelessness and confusion as clearly as a thousand spoken words.

Many of these at-risk children were raised in unstable environments, which could lead them to make the same mistakes as their parents, sending them to prison or worse.

But Marilyn Gambrell wants to break that cycle. 

 In 1993, she founded No More Victims Inc., a nonprofit organization dedicated to helping children of incarcerated parents.

A former Texas parole officer, Gambrell saw firsthand the need to help children and teens who were left behind by one or both parents serving time.

“My goal is for this child to feel healthy enough and healed that they didn’t want to take their own life or someone else’s. Just give them what they need, love them, support them, provide basic needs. They will fly,” she says.

The statistics on prison parents are staggering. According to Justice Department estimates, 2.3 percent of children under 18 in the United States have at least one parent in prison.

Together, 52 percent of state prison inmates and 63 percent of federal prisoners reported an estimated total of 1,706,600 minor children, according to the Justice Department.

In 2000, Gambrell brought No More Victims to the classroom at a local high school where a large majority of students had experienced the effects of incarceration on their families.

Soon after, she opened a community center where teens could take care of basic necessities such as getting food and diapers for their own kids, doing their laundry, and getting, from Gambrell, the love and support they never had.

Update to the State Budget Story

State budget to take about $84 million from Alameda County over next two years

by Chris Metinko
Oakland Tribune

Updated: 07/22/2009 08:20:15 AM PDT

With state officials ready to approve a budget to close a $26.3 billion shortfall in Sacramento, Alameda County leaders will have to head back to work to try to balance the budget on a local level.

The budget deal set to be approved in Sacramento calls for $4.3 billion to be diverted from local governments into the state’s finances. Alameda County will lose about $84 million in tax money over the next two years, said County Administrator Susan Muranishi.

The biggest hit will come from the state’s borrowing of nearly $2 billion in property tax money that goes to local governments. Alameda County will lose $40 million from that cut alone. In addition, the county stands to lose $35 million in gas tax money and $9 million in redevelopment money to the state over the next two years.

“There is no way we can look in to forecast and tell people we are not in for a rough ride,” said Supervisor Keith Carson at Tuesday’s board of supervisors meeting.

Carson added that some of the details of the new state budget deal still are not clear — likely even to those in Sacramento — but that it is clear local governments will lose out.

To that end, Alameda County supervisors agreed Tuesday to join what likely will be a joint lawsuit with many other counties against the governor and the state finance director to try to get back gas tax money, which funds the county’s public works department.

Despite the lawsuit, county officials know they will have to go without.

 ”We’re clearly at the bottom of the food chain,” Muranishi said. “Clearly we’re going to have a lot of work to do locally.”

Just last month the board of supervisors approved a $2.4 billion budget that closed a $178 million shortfall — the largest ever for the county — and included program cuts and layoffs.

The county budget cut 285 of the county’s 9,316 full-time-equivalent positions, including about 100 positions in the Sheriff’s Office. Many of the job cuts will come from positions already eliminated within the past year, as well as positions currently vacant. Less than half the job cuts will come via layoffs.

The cuts to the county’s Public Protection program, which includes the Sheriff’s Office, were the largest. The county’s Probation Department lost 49 positions, the District Attorney’s Office lost 14 attorney positions, and the Public Defender’s Office lost 15 jobs.

Public protection was not the only affected program area. The county’s health care services cut $30 million from their budgets but avoided layoffs.

The county’s public assistance programs weren’t as lucky, losing $45 million from their budgets and losing 10 vacant positions.

The CA State Budget and Library Funding

EFFECTS OF PROPOSITION 1A FUNDING LOSS

The California legislature is seriously considering borrowing 8% of library property taxes on 2009/2010. This will force the Library to cut hours, services and programs. This chart demonstrates the significance of the loss of these revenues.

$1.2 Million Loss
Librarian	32,597 hours
Library Clerk	42,826 hours
Page	56,127 hours
Books	34,158
CDs	60,000
DVDs	39,695
Children’s Programs	2,400 programs
Teen Programs	2,492 programs
Literacy Training	3,692 programs

 “Libraries are more essential than ever. Reading is still the most basic survival skill in today’s information driven world.”  William Ecenbarger 

How can you help?

 Please support your library by asking the State Legislature to exempt libraries from the Proposition 1A property tax shift.  

Time is of the essence, so phone calls and faxes are preferred; letters are also welcomed.

 http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/asm-addresses.html

Thank you for your help!