What Three-, Four-, and Five-Year-Olds do in a Classroom Library Corner: Interactions with Books

Abstract

This study looked at the types of interactions three-, four-, and five-year-olds had with books in a preschool classroom library corner. This study took place in a rural cooperative preschool program consisting of 21 students. Questions addressed were: What percentage of time spent in the library corner was actually spent interacting with books? What Interactions did students have with books in the library corner? What percentage of time spent in the library corner was spent on each type of interaction with books? The data were collected over 32 classroom observation periods. Each observation took place during center time which was ten minutes dally. Every sixty seconds the researcher placed a tally mark ln the correct interaction category on the checklist for each student in the library center. The six categories observed were adult reading to child, child reading to adult, child reading to self, student reading to student, choosing books, and off task. The researcher completed both a qualitative and quantitative analysis of the data collected. This study shows that children exposed to literature are taking advantage of the opportunity. This can be seen in the fact that these 21 preschoolers were on task interacting with books 77% of the time.