Libraries Far From English-Only

Not far from a giant, stuffed Curious George perched on a shelf, librarian Su Chung surveys a collection of foreign-language books in the children’s section of Garden Grove Regional Library.

Here patrons can borrow books such as “The Story of the Chinese Zodiac,” written in Chinese and English. Or a Japanese/English picture book with words such as “grimy,” “grease” and “greenhouse.” Or a Korean children’s storybook that translates “I Like My Mother the Most.”

“Some parents encourage their kids to keep their mother tongue,” said Chung, offering one reason parents bring their youngsters to this section.

While non-English materials in classrooms are more scarce since voters in June mandated the virtual elimination of bilingual education, parents and students can still find plenty of foreign language books, videos and tapes for children at many local libraries.

While Spanish-language children’s books are widely available, some Orange County libraries also are building on their earlier efforts to supply reading material in Vietnamese, Korean, Chinese and Japanese.

When the Garden Grove Regional Library began its collection in the 1970s, library workers walked door to door among businesses to solicit foreign-language reading material. The library now has a couple of thousand volumes in its children’s section and adds up to 30 new books in good months, Chung said. The children’s section also includes foreign-language videos and story tapes that come with books.

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Such books often provide an important function for immigrant parents and their children, librarians said.

“I think it’s important for them to assimilate in the American society,” said Westminster Library branch manager Mary Ann Hutton. “But as they acculturate, they also need to keep their own culture. These books help them.”

With Vietnamese accounting for about 25% of the library’s patrons, the Westminster Library specializes in Vietnamese children’s and adult books. Others such as Anaheim Central Library have a larger collection of children’s books in Spanish.

Libraries see this as a crucial component in fostering a generation of readers. One of the most important indicators of a future reader is whether the parents read regularly to a child.

Some librarians noticed that parents who aren’t well-versed in English tended to be embarrassed to read to their children in English. By providing children’s books in foreign languages, the library is encouraging parents to come to the library, take books home and read often to youngsters.

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“It’s not important whether they read in English or Spanish,” said Sharon Johnson, a children’s librarian for Anaheim Central Library. “The important thing is that they read. A child is going to imitate the parent.”

The library recently doubled shelf space for Spanish children’s books collected. They have placed a flag that says “Libros en Espanol” in that section to guide patrons and let newcomers know right away that the materials are available.

The library also is encouraging Spanish-speaking parents with “how to” parenting books as well as simple Spanish-English books that help them learn English.

“Como Ayudar a su Hijo a Aprender a Leer” shows parents how to teach their children to read. “400 Difficultades y Problemas del Nino” teaches parents how to handle child-rearing problems.

The Irvine-University Park Library has several thousand volumes of books in Chinese, Japanese, Persian, French, Vietnamese and Spanish, said children’s librarian Julie Fitch. Roughly a third of the foreign-language collection, she said, consists of children’s books.

The library recently moved its non-English children’s books into the adult foreign language section, after librarians noticed that parents were the ones who usually sought these materials for their youngsters.

Even at the Newport Beach Public Library, where non-English speaking residents make up a much smaller percentage of the patrons than in other areas, officials are considering whether to increase their limited foreign collection after receiving several requests, librarian John Callahan said.

The Garden Grove Chapman Library just began a collection of Vietnamese books for children and adults this year after receiving 80 from another county library. The library also received a couple of hundred dollars from Friends of the Library and $3,000 from the county, which the library plans to use to purchase more Vietnamese books this year, said branch manager George Tait.

“I think it’s difficult enough for people to relocate to another country and leave everything,” Tait said. “ I think it’s nice for the library to provide material to show children something of their heritage and culture.”