Every Day Is a Reading and Writing Day

Launched in October 2013 in the United States (US), this multimedia, bilingual (English/Spanish) set of resources is designed to support children's early literacy development, drawing on the appeal of the Sesame Street friends to motivate young children and families to make the most of everyday opportunities to talk, read, and write together. In response to the wide gap in literacy rates prevailing between children of high- and low-income families, Sesame Workshop, the nonprofit organisation behind Sesame Street, partnered with the community-development-focused Insurance Industry Charitable Foundation (IICF) in an effort to:

• Help parents and caregivers realise the role they play in creating the foundation for literacy in their children;
• Provide volunteers with engaging, fun-filled, and educational resources that they can use to positively impact the literacy development of undeserved children across the US; and
• Present children with games and activities that will stimulate their interest in talking, reading, and writing from an early age.

Using the entertainment-education strategy to foster communication between parents and young children, Every Day Is a Reading and Writing Day is a digital destination for literacy that includes:

• Video segments that draw from everyday life and model ways for parents to engage their children in activities around vocabulary, reading, and writing;
• Materials volunteers can use to plan fun-filled literacy-based experiences for children and families;
• A parent/caregiver guide with information and activities to encourage literacy development for children ages two to five. The guide also includes additional material that parents can use to help form the building blocks for literacy in children ages zero to two; and
• A mobile site with videos, games, and activities for parents and volunteers to enjoy with children on-the-go, as well as an online section dedicated to Every Day Is a Reading and Writing Day on sesamestreet.org.