{"id":7726,"date":"2025-10-17T02:56:12","date_gmt":"2025-10-17T02:56:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/7726\/"},"modified":"2025-10-17T02:56:12","modified_gmt":"2025-10-17T02:56:12","slug":"parents-empowered-to-nurture-budding-bookworms-at-austin-african-american-book-festival","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/7726\/","title":{"rendered":"Parents empowered to nurture budding bookworms at Austin African American Book Festival"},"content":{"rendered":"

AUSTIN, Texas \u2014 The first chapter of a lifelong reader begins at home, and the Austin African American Book Festival<\/a> is taking steps to help parents promote early literacy in their children. <\/p>\n

Author Maya Payne Smart <\/a>joined We Are Austin’s Sierra Waggoner to discuss an upcoming event designed to support families and caregivers in nurturing young readers.<\/p>\n

Smart<\/a> shared that her passion for early literacy comes from understanding the vital role parents play in their children\u2019s educational journey. The Raising Readers event offers resources and encouragement to families in the Austin community, providing tools to build strong reading skills from an early age.<\/p>\n

She offered simple strategies parents can use at home, like reading together daily, asking questions about stories, and making books part of everyday routines. Active parental involvement, Smart explained, is crucial because it sets the foundation for academic success and a love of learning.<\/p>\n

To make reading fun and habitual, she suggested turning storytime into a playful activity, incorporating books into daily life, and celebrating small milestones in reading progress.<\/p>\n

For those interested in learning more or attending the event, information is available through the Austin African American Book Festiva<\/a>l website linked here! <\/a><\/p>\n

Before signing off, the show hosted a lighthearted segment called \u201cDecode the Emoji \u2013 Children\u2019s Book Edition,\u201d where Maya and Sierra guessed children\u2019s book titles from emoji clues\u2014bringing a little extra fun to the love of reading!<\/p>\n

To see more of Maya’s work make sure to check her out at mayasmart.com!<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"AUSTIN, Texas \u2014 The first chapter of a lifelong reader begins at home, and the Austin African American…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":7727,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[132,7522,134,133,7527,7521,7525,4663,7523,7524,7526],"class_list":["post-7726","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-austin","tag-austin","tag-austin-african-american-book-festival","tag-austin-headlines","tag-austin-news","tag-childrens-books","tag-early-literacy","tag-educational-journey","tag-parents","tag-raising-readers","tag-reading-skills","tag-storytime"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7726","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7726"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7726\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7727"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7726"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7726"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7726"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}