While human connection and bonding are crucial to the health, growth, and early development of children, babies in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) can have a hard time making that connection to caregivers. The NICU Little Listeners program was founded by Pediatrician Dr. Christina Wong a few years ago, as one of the ways to help encourage parent and baby bonding in the Texas Children’s NICU through verbal communication, such as reading and talking aloud.
“Because early reading is critical for language, speech, and brain development, one of my initial goals at Texas Children’s was to help build the Little Listeners program and library in our NICU,” shares Dr. Wong. “It’s understandable for parents to feel stressed while their baby is in the NICU. They can sometimes forget that there are things they can do to help normalize the experience, such as reading and talking to their baby. We wanted to establish a program to support them.”
Dr. Wong, along with Library Coordinator and Child Life team member Catherine Zdunkewicz, and the Newborn Center Child Life and Music Therapy team – Emma Page, Maribeth Vain, Olivia Priolo and Anna Boucher – have combined their passions for children and literacy to take the program to the next level by creating the NICU Little Listeners Reading Initiative.
The NICU Little Listeners Reading team strives to help normalize the experience for NICU babies by providing parents with educational classes and books they can read to their babies. They also encourage Nursing team members to speak to babies by their name and model good verbal communication and gentle touch stimulation for parents.
Little Listeners Read-A-Thon coming in September
The Little Listeners team is excited to launch their first major event at Texas Children’s – a Read-A-Thon where NICU families will receive a new book on each day during the week-long celebration September 19-23, in honor of National Literacy Month and NICU Awareness Month. All Texas Children’s team members are encouraged to participate – watch for more information!
How the Little Listeners Reading program works
Prior to the coronavirus pandemic, the NICU Little Listeners Reading team encouraged parents to borrow books from the Pi Beta Phi Book Nooks located throughout the NICU to read to their child in the NICU, and siblings during visits. Post-pandemic, the team shifted to donating books to every family who arrives at Texas Children’s NICU, allowing them to keep the book and build their child’s library at home.
Upon arrival, the team provides families with the book Read Baby, Every Day by pediatrician Dr. John Hutton, along with their admission packet. The team also donates educational books to NICU families such as Calm Baby, Gently and Sleep Baby, Safe and Snug, also by Dr. Hutton. The books, reviewed by parents and Texas Children’s CPR educators, help educate families about safe sleep and promote injury prevention. Because admission is often prolonged, The Newborn Center Child Life and Music Therapy Team gives more books to families bi-monthly, along with a bookmark featuring tips and benefits of reading to your baby. Families receive about six books throughout the year, available in both English and Spanish.
Zdunkewicz has purchased a remarkable 2,860 books for the CPR educational class and admission packets with funds donated by the Houston Pi Beta Phi Foundation. The Little Listeners Reading team has also purchased more than 1,200 books for bimonthly Little Listeners book distribution.
“What we’d like everyone to remember is that no baby is too small or too sick to benefit from being gently read to or talked to,” Dr. Wong shares. “No matter how scary the situation is, or how scared you are by the machines and everything else going on, you can still read and talk to them. Reading and talking to your baby are two of the best things you can do for them in life.”
Literacy awareness resources
You can learn more about Texas Children’s libraries and library resources on the Child Life Department webpage, and we encourage you to explore Read Aloud, a website dedicated to promoting the benefits of reading by providing fun educational tips, flyers and other tools for literacy advocates.