General description: Matching Children with Level-Appropriate Books and Engaging Families
One Sentence Summary: This project seeks to improve reading abilities of early grade readers and foster parental engagement through a technology-based innovative tool (Mundo de Libros) that will recommend Spanish-written books to each child based on his/her reading abilities and interests.
Challenge: Due, in part, to a lack of access to appropriate reading resources and low parental involvement in children’s education, many students in Mexico do not achieve basic levels of Reading proficiency and lack agency in their reading decisions. This problem intensifies through schooling and the gap among children with different reading skills increases as they grow older.
The Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) in 2012, revealed that approximately 4 percent of 15-year-old Mexican students performed below basic reading level and 15 percent showed serious difficulties understanding simple text. Research has proven that family involvement and Access to level-appropriate reading materials are fundamental for the development of reading skills and good reading habits, especially among early grade readers. Unfortunately, the Reading curriculum in most Latin American countries often follows a “one size fits all” approach and does not consider book-leveling strategies.
Project Overview: “Mundo de Libros” is a technology-built platform that will give Spanish-written book recommendations to early grade readers based on their individual reading skills and interests. Such recommendations will be generated by an algorithm developed for this project to match children reading abilities and interests to books characteristics. In addition, workshops will be conducted to promote parental involvement and guide parents on how to best support their children’s reading process and detect possible reading difficulties. In its first stage, the project Will be implemented in 10 community libraries and reach approximately 500 children. In a second stage, the project is expected to be expanded to schools.
Key Collaborators: Que Funciona para el Desarrollo, A.C. and Fundación Proacceso ECO A.C.
Location Implemented: Localities in the State of Mexico, Mexico
Partners: Arturo Aguilar, Adriana Ontiveros, and Maria Elena Ortega