As we honor Memorial Day and all of the fallen soldiers that have given their lives to our country and the military families that make huge sacrifices for our safety and freedom we were reminded of why we do what we do at Caribu. Being apart from loved ones for deployment, or training is tough on parents and kids and maintaining relationships with loved ones that are stationed far away can be difficult. Spending quality time with family is important for both kids and adults, reading together can be a great way to stay connected to families that can’t physically be together.
• Reading together strengthens family bonds, and helps children feel that they are important.
• Keeping up with a bedtime story routine can help ease the transitions military families go through.
• Kids need to read aloud or be read to for at least 15 minutes a day to gain the language development and literacy skills necessary to read on grade level.
United Through Reading is a nonprofit organization with the mission to “unite military families facing physical separation by facilitating the bonding experience of reading aloud together.” The focus of the program is to have military service members send their families video recordings of them reading books out loud. According to United Through Reading’s website, long separations from family members can affect a child’s ability to learn. Reading out loud to kids is an effective way to ensure they develop the reading skills they need to be on grade level.
The deployment of a family member can leave kids experiencing complex emotions they need help understanding and expressing. Reading together can be a powerful tool of connection. Books give kids new ways to express their feelings and explore their interests. Talking together about feelings, and finding characters in books that mirror their emotions can help kids express themselves. When one parent or family member is stationed far away reading together can give them insight into their child’s education progress, emotional state, and interests. Communication is important in any relationship but facilitating a long distance parent-child relationship is difficult. Reading together reinforces family bonds and can help make homecomings easier.
Military families need an easy and fun way to stay connected. Social media is a convenient tool, along with phone calls, and video chats, but younger children need engaging content to hold their attention. Caribu was inspired by a viral photo of a soldier in an a coffee shop attempting to read a story to his daughter through a webcam. The photo exposed a real problem separated families face and influenced the creation of Caribu. Sharing story time with kids is vital to their future success and gives families the opportunity to bond. Caribu was designed with kids in mind so it is tailored to be engaging for them, the library is full of books that teach life lessons, but more importantly, teach the foundations of literacy skills. All kids deserve to spend time reading with their parents, and military kids sacrifice a lot for their parents to serve. We are so thankful to our military families and those who have served.
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Written by Rachel Gambach Intern @Caribu, editor & contributor for Caribu’s blog and student at UCF.
