Multilingual Books & Literacy

Parents can help their children develop literacy -- and a love of reading -- by reading to them in their native language. Research shows that teaching children to read in their first language also promotes higher levels of reading achievement in English (Goldenberg 2008).

Free Multilingual Online Libraries

• Unite for Literacy: Early Learning eBooks: More than 100 original ebooks carefully crafted to connect with young children and their families. Books are written in English and include audio narration in English and 28 languages.
• Worldstories: A growing collection of short stories including retold traditional tales and new short stories from around the world. The stories can be read and listened to online, or downloaded and they're all free!
• International Children's Online Library: A searchable library of digital children's books in more than 50 languages.
• Rosetta Project: Books in Multiple Languages: Digital books in more than 40 languages.

Multilingual Books for Sale

• Amazon.com: Children's Books by Language
• WordLanguages.com: Children's Books

In English

• Storytime: How to Share Books with your Child (video) (Raising A Reader Massachusetts)
• Importance of Home Language (Head Start)

In Spanish

• ¡A leer se ha dicho! (Colorín Colorado)
• Consejos para ayudar a los niños a aprender a leer: Guía de recursos para las familias hispanas (US Department of Education)
• Consejos para padres (Colorín Colorado)
• Family Guide: Give a Big Boost to a Child You Love/Guía para la familia: Impulse a los niños que ama (Reading Rockets)
• Importance of Home Language (en Espanol) (Head Start)
• Learn & Grow Together: Guia familiar: Aprender y crecer juntos (Mass Department of Early Education & Care)
• Maneras divertidas y eficaces de leer con los niños (Colorín Colorado)
• Oportunidades diarias para desarrollar el alfabetismo (Mass Department of Early Education & Care)

In Portuguese

• Learn & Grow Together: Guia familiar: Aprender e crescer juntos (Mass Department of Early Education & Care)
• Oportunidades diárias para desenvolver a alfabetização (Mass Department of Early Education & Care)

In Other Languages

• Reading tips for Parents (Colorín Colorado)
• Arabic
• Chinese
• Haitian Creole
• Hmong
• Korean
• Navajo
• Russian
• Tagalog
• Vietnamese
• Family Guide: Give a Big Boost to a Child You Love (Reading Rockets)
• Hmong/English
• Somali/English
• Preschool Guides for Learning (Mass Department of Early Education & Care)
• Talk!  Daily opportunities for building literacy (English) 
  (Spanish) (Haitian) (Khmer) (Chinese) (Portuguese)
• Learn!  Learning how to learn 
  (Spanish) (Haitian) (Khmer) (Chinese) (Portuguese)
• More multilingual infant/toddler and preschool learning guides

If you know of any additional resources to add to this page, please email matsol @ matsol.org.