Bookstart Toddler and Pre-Schooler

Frequently asked questions

• Who are the target audience for these resources?

  Our target audience for these resources are low income families with children aged 1-4, who may need more help to make shared reading a regular part of their lives. The offer has been designed with practitioners and with families from our target groups.

  Partners have used many different approaches to find the best routes to families; overall these could be described as:

  • Geographical – where partners have identified settings or routes working in areas of higher deprivation 
    and/or
  • Identifying routes or organisations that, by their nature, reach families in our target groups.

  There has been much work to define the multiple ways to do this in greater detail - with a range of methods having been used by participating partners.

• What are the aims of the pilots?

  The Bookstart Toddler and Pre-schooler pilots aim to:

  • Provide more target families with the tools and information that they need to support and excite them about sharing stories together
  • Provide our partners with tools and information to support their work with families
  • Contribute to learning what support target families need for sharing stories together in the early years - and where, when and how BookTrust and partners may best provide this support.
  • Find successful routes to reaching families
  • Learn how we can better support our partners' work with families.

• How can I make best use of the resources?

  Storyteller pack

  The Storyteller pack is a toolkit developed to support our partners in sharing stories with families. It can be used in settings with families as part of group storytelling sessions, or with individual families at home.

  You can share the books, use props to help bring them to life, and explore the activity cards for further suggestions of how to extend the story.

  Help families to see how they can replicate the storytelling experience at home by pointing out what you're doing, building their confidence and emphasising that it doesn't need to be perfect for their child to enjoy it!

  Toddler

  Bookstart Toddler packs have been designed for 1-2 year-old children. When gifting the packs, you can highlight some of the messaging printed on the pack envelope, such as how they can access further activities on our Family Hub, or how they can join their local library.

  If you have time, you can even try modelling for families how you might use the books and resources with a child - showing, for example, how parents/carers can use the finger puppet as a character through which to tell the story or sing a rhyme.

  Pre-schooler

  Bookstart Pre-schooler packs have been designed for 3-4 year-old children. When gifting the packs, you can highlight some of the messaging printed on the pack envelope, such as how they can access further activities on our Family Hub, or how they can join their local library.

  If you have time, you can even try modelling for families how you might use the books and resources with a child - showing, for example, how Everybody Has a Body can be used to help talk about differences.

• What resources, other than the gifted packs, are available for families?

  Alongside the physical packs, we have also created a digital Family Hub on which families can find further activities, read-along videos, book suggestions and advice for reading with their child. Families can access the Hub via a QR code on the back of their pack, or by going to booktrust.org.uk/familyhub.

• How does this pilot link to BookTrust’s other work?

  In Wales, Bookstart Toddler and Pre-schooler are just one part of BookTrust's early years reading journey. Families are gifted their first Bookstart Baby pack by their Health Visitor at 6 months followed by their Bookstart Early Years pack between ages 2-3 years. Both packs contain two picture books and tips for families to enjoy sharing stories with their child.

  The Pori Drwy Stori programme builds upon Bookstart. It's an exciting bilingual programme for Nursery and Reception aged children in Wales. Children taking part receive books, rhymes, activities and games aimed at supporting their literacy, numeracy, speaking and listening skills in the Foundation Phase.

  Pori Drwy Stori is funded by Welsh Government and delivered by BookTrust Cymru. For more information please visit booktrust.org.uk/poridrwystori

• How will the pilot be evaluated?

  We are evaluating the pilot on several levels - through a mixture of quantitative broad-scaled learning and qualitative conversations with individual families and partners.

  As part of our broad-scaled learning, which we are conducting mainly through family and partner surveys, we will be looking to find out more about who our offer is reaching, and gathering some initial impressions about how partners and families are engaging with our resources.

  Alongside this, we are also planning to work closely with some of our partners and families to understand in more detail the impact that packs are making and how they can be improved for future iterations.

• How does the pilot fit into BookTrust’s future work?

  This pilot is a first step in BookTrust's work to learn what we do in the early years to better support our target families.

  We will continue to develop our early years offers as we increase our understanding of how BookTrust can best provide this support - both through evaluation of this pilot and further research projects.

• If I have further queries or questions, who can I contact?

  Please email [email protected].