Bokstart.
Sweden.
December 26th 2023
Swedish Arts Council
P.O. Box 27215, SE-102 53 Stockholm
Mission: Create the conditions for all children to develop a language that is as good as possible according to their conditions, and which makes it possible to develop as individuals with the ability to actively participate in society.
Nina Suatan Anna Hällgren
Project leader
www.bokstart.se www.artscouncil.se www.kulturradet.se
Government authority
2 (Bokstart, Arts council Sweden)
Bokstart.
Sweden.
2014
Goals: strengthen parents in their important role; develop collaboration between public libraries, child health care and preschool as well as with the family; increase, and disseminate, knowledge of young children’s language and reading development.
Government.
We have a government remit to spread Bokstart in Sweden 2017-2020. Our projects are spread from the northern to the most southern parts of the country.
Not for profit.
None.
Consistent: addresses children 0-3 years; parental support; cooperation between public libraries and healthcare/preschool (both or one of them) Not consistent: number of books handed out; book titles (chosen by projects); number of meetings with families; ages of children when they receive home visits, books and are invited to activities; methods differ – home visits by librarian and/or nurse, library activities, family centre activities…; led by public library or county library.
Books (one to three), information material, information from local library etc. Varies between the different projects.
Yes.
Library, Health clinic, Preschool, family centre, Open preschool.
Librarians, healthcare workers, nursery school staff.
Unknown
Most projects work with targeted groups: asylum seekers, socio economically vulnerable families, areas with low school results. Some projects target all children of certain age groups. Some projects combine targeting all children of a certain age with target groups of special needs.
Unknown
Birth – 6 months, 6 – 12 months, 12 – 24 months, 2-4 years.
Through our website Bokstart.se we provide articles and films on different topics related to language development to disseminate knowledge, primarily targeted to the various professions involved. Also about special needs. The projects get to know individual families and can provide resources like customized books and relevant information.
All language populations that we meet are served by our programme as best we can. Sometimes with the use of translators. Some of our information material is translated into 25 languages and can be printed out from our website free of charge.
After our pilot period (2014-2017) we made an evaluation. A new, nationwide, evaluation, is planned for next year. Research is being made by some of our projects (not longitudinal though).
