MARINE CORPS AIR STATION IWAKUNI, Japan -- Finding the best way to spend time and connect with their children is just one of the many challenges parents face in child rearing.
Because of the demands of their military duties, for the military mother or father it can be a bit harder to find the best activity to get the most out of their relationship with their kids.
The station offers various programs to the community, which help parents connect with their children. One of those programs is the Story Time hour offered every Thursday at the station library between 10 and 11 a.m.
Story Time at the library here offers a lot of benefits to both the participating parents and the children.
“Story Time allows the children to interact with other children their age as well as interact with their parents,” said Jessica Ossiander, a library technician and Story Time reader. “The parents can ask (their children) questions about what’s happening during the story and get that connection and communication with their child throughout the story.”
The readings take place in the children’s section of the library and involve singing songs, reading children’s books and art-and-craft projects.
Parents are interact with their children throughout the whole hour.
Ossiander said there’s a lot more interaction going on through Story Time than with watching television or playing video games, because there is no technology to disconnect the parent from their child and it is simply the parent with their child and a book.
Parents with children between 18 months and five years of age usually attend the Story Time hour.
“We are always promoting early literacy for children, and literacy can start as early as birth to two (years of age),” said Ossiander. “We want them to get comfortable with reading stories and the concept of turning the pages and what’s happening next. A lot of the questions that we ask during story time apply to the questions they are going to be asked in school. So we are using the story time to promote good reading habits even when they are this little.”
Many of the parents who take their children to Story Time describe it as a very special hour for them.
“(Story Time) is definitely a bonding time for us,” said April Paris, mother of two and Story Time attendee. “It’s time for us to cuddle.”
Paris said, aside from bringing them to Story Time to bond, she also enjoys having that special bonding moment with each one of them alone by reading to her two sons individually at home every day.
Aside from forming a bond with their children, parents see the benefits of interacting with their children through Story Time and reading.
“(With my oldest) I’ve seen a big difference,” said Paris. “He’s talking a lot more and understands a lot more. He loves books.”
Paris said she believes parents who want to start reading to their children and may not know how to go about it will really benefit from attending Story Time, where they can learn some of the techniques the librarians use while reading to the children.
While most of the parents who attend Story Time are mothers and the occasional father, the station library technicians believe military parents would really benefit by attending Story Time too.
“We would love to see more service members come with their children,” said Ossiander. “We love having the moms, but we would really love to see the service members as well. I think they would really enjoy just a little time with their child to do a craft and to do a story and to sit down with their children.”
For more information about Story Time or any other program offered at the station library, call the station library at 253-3078.