Sign Up Your Child for Dolly Parton's
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Imagination Library
Click here or on the logo to register your child for Dolly Parton's Imagination
Library.
Suggested donation of $30
can be mailed to:
Jackson Community Foundation Early Childhood Fund
One Jackson Square,
Suite 308
Jackson, MI 49201 |
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With just over half of Tennessee’s population of under-five children currently registered in Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library –and over 80,000 Tennessee five-year-olds who have “graduated” from the statewide program since 2004– the Tennessee Board of Regents has completed the first large-scale study on the Imagination Library’s impact on the learning preparedness of children now enrolled in public schools.
Responding kindergarten and pre-K teachers collectively affirmed that children who had participated in the Imagination Library were “better prepared” than students who had not participated in the program. Read more...
What Are Teachers from Other Communities Saying?
“I inform everyone I know about the Imagination Library, including my own family
members. I cannot thank you enough for this program! By the time the children start
school, they are ready to learn about the early elements of literature and print. You
don't have to teach them how to hold the book, that print has meaning, or how to
‘read the pictures’ to tell a story. You also see it in their writing skills – they can plan
and create their own stories. I hear, ‘But, I don't know what to write!’ a lot less often.”
“Lap time and story reading prior to entering kindergarten is directly related to how
well a child will read in the future.”
“Students are proud of their books and bring them to school for me to read.”
Click here to read more teacher comments and see the impact of Imagination Library on children who participated.
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The Story of Dolly Parton's Imagination Library
In 1996, Dolly Parton launched an exciting new effort to benefit the children of her home county in east Tennessee. Dolly wanted to foster a love of reading among her county’s preschool children and their families. She wanted children to be excited about books and to feel the magic that books can create. Moreover, she could insure that every child would have books, regardless of their family’s income.
So she decided to mail a brand new, age appropriate book each month to every child under 5 in Sevier County. With the arrival of every child’s first book, the classic The Little Engine That Could ™, every child could now experience the joy of finding their very own book in their mail box. These moments continue each |
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month until the child turns 5—and in their very last month in the program they receive Look Out Kindergarten Here I Come.
Needless to say the experience has been a smashing success. So much so that many other communities clamored to provide the Imagination Library to their children. Dolly thought long and hard about it and decided her Foundation should develop a way for other communities to participate. The Foundation asked a blue ribbon panel of experts to select just the right books and secured Penguin Group USA to be the exclusive publisher for the Imagination Library. Moreover a database was built to keep track of the information.
Consequently, in March of 2000 she stood at the podium of The National Press Club in Washington, D.C. and revealed the plan for other communities to provide the Imagination Library to their children. And as only Dolly can say it, she wanted to “put her money where her mouth is – and with such a big mouth that’s a pretty large sum of money” and provide the books herself to the children of Branson, Missouri and Myrtle Beach, South Carolina – communities where her businesses now operate. If other leaders in their communities were willing to do the same, well something big might just happen.
You know what? It did!
Here’s how it works:
A community must make the program accessible to all preschool children in their area. The community pays for the books and mailing, promotes the program, registers the children, and enters the information into the database.
From there The Dollywood Foundation takes over and manages the system to deliver the books to the home. You can find out more of the operational details on other pages in this website – so what are waiting for! Hundreds of communities are providing books to hundreds of thousands of children. |
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