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Introduction Welcome to Storytime and Beyond: Having Fun with Literacy ! You’re in for a bonanza of fun. Are you a children’s librarian or teacher/parent/grandparent/family/caregiver of children getting ready to read? Do you work as a literacy coach or counselor with older youngsters and even adults who need literacy motivation? Most of all, are you someone who is interested in opening up the world of books to those who may not yet have discovered it? YOU should explore this book! Often literacy is considered the job of librarians and teachers. But parents, families, and other caregivers are almost always a child’s first teachers. They lay the first foundation of reading by reading to their children. Bedtime stories are crucial, but word games, songs, and lullabies are equally valuable. How many youngsters learn their alphabet by singing along with someone else? For sure, librarians and teachers do literacy—you could even call them literacy gurus —but anyone can get into the act, and in on the fun, too. (NOTE: Singing is one of the five Every Child Ready to Read (ECRR) practices. Read a full description of ECRR in Melanie’s Chapter 4 “Musical Storytimes Build Literacy Skills.”) What can you expect to find inside our enticing orange cover? There’s something useful, interesting, creative, and above all, fun in every chapter. Whether you read straight through or just dip into the various sections, you may frequently find yourself thinking, “I could do that!” The main title really sums it up: Storytime and Beyond . Storytimes are a way of life for children’s librarians and for many parents/grandparents/caregivers who faithfully bring their kids to the library. And this book is packed with tips, scripts, bibliographies, statistics, and anecdotes that relate directly to storytimes. But there’s a lot of literacy to be picked up after storytime is over. Reinforcing storytime events at home or in another setting contributes to the original experience. There are many other ways to enhance literacy. And they’re painless (and fun )! Here’s a quick look at what you will find in the following six chapters. (Note: the authors went halfsies . . . Kathy wrote the first three chapters and Melanie did Chapters 4, 5, and 6. But this is not a numbers book! Maybe if they do a sequel . . .) CHAPTER 1: ALL I REALLY NEED TO KNOW I LEARNED FROM ABC BOOKS Speaking of fun and painless . . . alphabet books are a terrific way to strengthen literacy. They can be used with almost any age, are fascinating to look at, come in a wide variety of topics, ix