IBBY-Yamada 2021: Italy

IBBY Italy: Mamma Lingua - introductory workshop on how to use books in many languages to foster a culture of mutual comprehension in families with pre-schoolers in Lombardy.

Mama Lingua is a multilingual project that aims to promote an inclusive culture where every language is valuable and worthy. It began as a project to identify a nucleus of quality books in the seven most spoken foreign languages (Albanian, Arabic, Chinese, French, English, Romanian and Spanish) in Lombardy to bring foreign families with pre-school children closer to reading. In 2015, a Mama Lingua bibliography of 127 books was created and distributed to libraries and librarians and volunteers were trained in pre-school reading and interculturalism. The current project focusses on sharing foreign language books and reading at home with children from birth to five years. The workshop was held in Milan on 12 and 13 November 2021 and was aimed at a national audience of librarians, early-year teachers, paediatricians, volunteers, booksellers, publishers and children’s literature promoters. The topics focussed on how to engage parents in reading activities, how to select good books and how to purchase them in other countries.

The programme folder is displayed right (click to enlarge) and can be downloaded here.