Often passive recreation parks, offer adults and seniors little more than a bench to sit on. Adding a Little Free Library to you park, can
Attract people to your space by adding a selection of reading material to your space.
$100 will buy you between 10 and 20 subscriptions.
This Little Free Library idea was developed by Park Chelsea under a Citizens Committee for New York City Grant. LFL's normally cost hundreds of dollars, this model can be built for under $50. At this price you can even afford to buy 2 one for childrens books, and another for magazine subscriptions, so as to offer reading material to older folks. Instructions on how to build it are at this link.
Here's why its important to have Little Free Library in parks...
-“Research consistently shows that children who live in low-income neighborhoods have little access to reading material in their public libraries, in their schools, and at home. After investigating access to reading material in different neighborhoods, Neuman and Celano (2001) concluded that that " ... children in middle-income neighborhoods were likely to be deluged with a wide variety of reading materials. However, children from poor neighborhoods would have to aggressively and persistently seek them out" (p. 15)
.If more access leads to more reading, and if more reading leads to better reading, writing, spelling, grammar, and a larger vocabulary (for overwhelming evidence, see Krashen, 2004), this means that the first step any literacy campaign needs to take is to make sure children have access to plenty of books. Link
Libraries are often few and far between
Looking at this map you'll see only 5 on the west side of Manhattan
In the same area there are at least 50 parks, playgrounds and other outdoor public spaces where little free libraries could be setup.
If you give kids reading opportunities in parks, they will read more.
