Inside out the Big Book Share

This article is from the January 2004 issue of Update.

In a classroom at HMP Nottingham, Paul and Mark need no second invitation to plunge into the heap of books strewn across the tables… They grab great colourful over-sized books and eagerly thumb the pages. Do they remember having stories read to them as children?… Paul says his mum used to tell him stories, but only tall ones. Quietly Anthony says "No"… He tentatively picks up a copy of Incy Wincy Spider and turns the pages while Elaine puts on a tape of another librarian reading Humpty Dumpty, and now they all listen because in a few minutes they’re going to choose books and make their own tape recordings to give to their children. Anthony can’t read, which is not a problem, because that’s what today is all about.’1

A teenage boy at a youth offending institute in southern England is overjoyed - not only because he’s been able to tape and send a story to his little sister, but because he’s recovered the pleasure of reading for himself. ‘My brain was mush when I came here, and now I’m reading again!’

A young ex-prisoner, with three of his five children, comes into a local library in Nottingham. ‘We’ve got a date with the librarian,’ he says. ‘She’s got the stories and tapes I did for the children when I was in prison, and she said they could join in the summer reading challenge.’

These stories illustrate some of the things starting to happen with the Big Book Share: prisoners sharing in their children’s reading and finding a chance to bond with their families; prisoners developing their own learning and self-esteem; libraries opening up to those who felt excluded.

The Big Book Share is a library project working:

• to enable parents in prison to contribute to their children’s reading development, playing an important part in family life outside prison;
• to build closer links between prisoners’ families and the library service.

Since 2000, the Reading Agency has been running the Big Book Share at HMP Nottingham, through a partnership between the prison and Nottingham City Libraries.

Key activities include:

• awareness sessions for both prison staff and prisoners about libraries and children’s books;
• opportunities for prisoners to tape stories for their children;
• special family visit sessions where prisoners share books and story activities with their children.

The original funding for this pilot came from Marks & Spencer and East Midlands Arts, with support from 20 children’s publishers.

In June 2002 the Big Book Share won the Libraries Change Lives Award.2

The Big Book Share at Nottingham is already showing the difference the project can make, as a positive and inspiring experience for prisoners and for their families, with potential for reducing the risk of prisoners re-offending as bonds within families are strengthened.

The Big Book Share’s long-term aim is to build on the public library and prison partnership so that programmes such as this, focusing on children’s and family reading, are a regular and important part of prison life.

In 2002 the project was awarded funding by the Paul Hamlyn Foundation, leading to the following developments:

• new family reading pilot projects at a further six prisons — providing models for working with different kinds of prisons and target groups. The experiences and good practice will be disseminated nationally;
• support for seven existing projects where prison and library service are working together on family reading activity. These associate projects will join in the Big Book Share network, sharing experiences, good practice and problem solving;
• development of the Big Book Share at HMP Nottingham, including outreach work with prisoners’ families.

An active and equal partnership between public library service and prison is what makes the Big Book Share effective. For both libraries and prisons the potential outcomes meet several of their services’ aims.

Some of the prisoners' favourite choices for their children:

Social inclusion
The government defines social exclusion as ‘a shorthand term for what can happen when people or areas suffer from a combination of linked problems such as unemployment, poor skills, low incomes, poor housing, high crime environments, bad health and family breakdown’. Finding joined-up solutions to tackle these problems and improve people’s lives is a priority for both prisons and libraries. Working to solve one problem can often help with others and certainly the Big Book Share, by focusing on family and skills needs, has the potential to help with employment and resettlement.

It is important that activities such as the Big Book Share are not add-ons but part of each organisation’s core activity, ideally written into the service level agreement between prison and public library. At HMP Nottingham, for example, evidence of partners’ mainstream commitment includes a Governor’s Order stressing the importance of the project, the fact that the prison library is a key service point in Nottingham City Libraries’ network, and the rota of children’s and community librarians running the Big Book Share sessions and activities in the prison.

Indeed for library staff this project has demonstrated the real significance of social exclusion and the value of their work combating it. Christina Dyer, a senior Service Manager for Nottingham City Libraries, says: ‘It’s a real opportunity to support and listen to carers, with maybe 15 children and four or five dads around — it’s something special.’

Statistics from HMP Nottingham show that, among the men taking part in the Big Book Share in the first year, there were only 16 rule infractions compared to 660 in the general prison population, and no instances of self-harm, compared to 63 in the prison that year.

To encourage resettlement and reduce re-offending, prisons are working wherever possible to build bridges with the community, and make connections with community organisations which can provide vital support for prisoners when they are released.

Through projects like the Big Book Share, library services and prisons can work together to develop this community support network for prisoners and their families, so that when prisoners are released the Big Book Share — in the widest possible sense — can continue through libraries out in the community.

Literacy and lifelong learning
Having difficulty with reading is no barrier to prisoners’ participation in a project like this. They can make up their own stories to tell on tape, or ask staff or fellow inmates to read a story which they choose, and preface this with a taped introduction and message to their children.

Evidence is coming through that family reading activity can often provide the motivation for prisoners to sign up for education courses to improve their own literacy skills. And of course, at the heart of the project, they are helping their children with their reading, and encouraging a lifelong enjoyment of reading.

Benefits of the partnership
The Big Book Share aims to make a difference for prisoners and their families. There are also gains for the partners delivering it. Benefits for the prison include:

• the opportunity to work positively and creatively towards their resettlement target;
• an enhanced local and national profile — HMP Nottingham, a local prison, is being seen as part of the community, not separate from it;
• an increased understanding by ‘outsiders’ of what prison is like on the inside;
• new skills and awareness for prison staff.

Gains for the library service include:

• the opportunity to contribute to the policy aims mentioned above;
• a heightened appreciation of libraries’ ability to contribute to these aims effectively — for example, the Big Book Share formed part of a successful bid for Nottingham City Council to win Beacon Council status, under ‘Regeneration through culture, sport and tourism’;
• increased awareness, use and enjoyment of libraries by prisoners’ families, prison staff — and the prisoners themselves on release;
• increased appreciation of the outreach and communication skills of library staff.

Another important partner was Marks & Spencer, whose Community Relations department funded the pilot programme in Nottingham.

They, too, benefited from skills and awareness sharing. Examples are store volunteers receiving training in storytelling from Nottingham Libraries — in exchange for sessions for library staff in customer relations.

It has not been all plain sailing — there are often tricky situations to resolve. The way a prison has to work can make it difficult to organise a session; both prison and library have pressures on staffing; prisoners may be moved on to another prison after only a week. The Big Book Share in Nottingham has learned that every session has to make an impact.

The pilot at Nottingham has shown that the following are vital:

• equal and active commitment from partners — from the top and throughout each organisation;
• ensuring that the project is written into library and prison service planning;
• both partners being clear about the desired outcomes for the project. ‘It’s for the children, we’re doing this for the children’ (prison staff at HMP Nottingham);
• having systems in place to keep track of progress towards those outcomes, including a record of all the ‘stories’ — the real life happenings which can give such powerful evidence of impact;
• ownership by all staff (in the prison this has been facilitated by Big Book Share awareness sessions for officers — many of whom are themselves parents of young children);
• prison librarian and prison staff becoming Big Book Share ‘champions’ — promoting the importance of the project and encouraging participation;
• regular input from public library staff, including both community and children’s librarians;
• providing families with information about public libraries and making connections for them wherever possible;
• building in factors to promote sustainability — e.g. inclusion in mainstream activity; regular training; promotion throughout the organisations involved; ongoing promotion and advocacy to as wide an audience as possible;
• persistence and flexibility.

The Big Book Share Phase Two
The lessons learned are being put to good use now in Big Book Share projects in different kinds of prisons and with different activities. Two of the new projects are in women’s prisons and two are in youth offending institutions; some will be working with more long-term prisoners and one has a focus on teenagers, both as the children or siblings of parents in prison, and as parents in prison themselves.

There are new local partners, including Surestart and youth offending teams, and key partners now in the national co-ordination of the project are Ascel (Association of Senior Children’s and Education Librarians), the DfES Offenders Learning and Skills Unit, the National Literacy Trust, the Paul Hamlyn Foundation, CILIP’s Prison Libraries Group and the Writers in Prison Network.

Through a newsletter and meetings all the projects are being encouraged to share their experience so that each one can use and adapt it for their own situations.

Nottingham’s experience, and that of similar projects, has already been distilled into a handbook and will also be used as the basis of training in family reading work with prisons, on offer from the Reading Agency.3

In Nottingham the Big Book Share goes from strength to strength. So many families take part in the fortnightly special BBS visit sessions that the venue has had to be moved to the chapel. They are always an inspiring and moving experience: for two hours the men and their partners are sharing books and stories with — and for — their children. No formal seating — for these two hours they can be a family.

When you visit the prison you will see stuck on doors, pipes, noticeboards, the simple blue and white stickers. ‘What’s this Big Book Share?’ a new prisoner might ask. And the others spread the word: ‘It’s the best thing the prison has ever done.’

References
1 The Independent Magazine describing a Big Book Share session.
2 The Libraries Change Lives Award is awarded annually and sponsored by the Library + information Show.
3 The Big Book Share. Libraries and Family Reading in Prison: a handbook. £7.50. For the handbook, and details about training, contact the Reading Agency, PO Box 96, St Albans, Herts AL1 3WP. For more information about the Big Book Share see www.readingagency.org.uk

Tricia Kings (tricia.kings@readingagency.org.uk) is now working as a freelance librarian on reader development projects for young people, including Young Cultural Creators (libraries in partnership with museums and galleries), and Their Reading Futures and the Big Book Share for the Reading Agency.

She was previously Co-ordinator of Library Services for Schools and Young People in Derbyshire.