Born2Learn Makes Learning a Downtown Family Event
Coming soon to downtown Springfield: A project that turns learning into a family adventure.
The Springfield Greene County Library District and several community groups will unveil Born2Learn-Springfield at 11 a.m. Friday, April 27, at the Discovery Center, 438 E. St. Louis St. Everyone is invited to attend the unveiling and press conference.
Born2Learn is a new resource for early learners and their families. Free Family Passports will guide participants to a variety of downtown locations where they can practice fun and easy activities essential to helping young children develop language, cognitive, creative and physical skills.
Activity descriptions will be posted in the windows of all participating organizations and several downtown businesses. Several sites including the Park Central Branch Library will also have indoor kiosk activity stations.
Children begin learning at birth. The learning that occurs on a daily basis during parent and child interactions is critical, and helps to lay the foundation for school readiness.
Skills such as counting, recognizing colors, identifying shapes and more can all be accomplished easily throughout the course of daily routines. Born2Learn activities will give parents, caregivers and kids all kinds of ideas for how to do that in the most fun ways.
There is no fee to participate, and the activities are designed to be self-guided. The activities can be accomplished outside and participants can spend as much time on each activity as they like. Completing the circuit of activities can be spread out over days, weeks, or months and repeated as often as parents wish.
Passports will be available beginning Saturday, April 28, during Community Wide Play Day at Fassnight Park from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Passports can also be found at Discovery Center, YMCA, Park Central Branch Library, Creamery Arts Center and the United Way office.
The project is a collaboration of the Discovery Center, United Way, YMCA, Springfield-Greene County Library District, Community Partnership of the Ozarks and Community Foundation of the Ozarks. The goal in producing this resource is to address the Community Report Card's school readiness red flag.
For more information on this program, contact Jennifer Kennally at United Way jkennally@uwozarks.com. For more information about the partner agencies and the Born2Learn Family Passport check these websites: uwozarks.com, discoverycenter.org, orymca.org, commpartnership.org or thelibrary.org.
Important support for Born2Learn-Springfield has been provided by Community Foundation of the Ozarks and Southern Missouri Container.
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