# Story Friends™

##### Curriculum name  
Story Friends

##### Purpose  
Improves children’s oral language skills, specifically vocabulary and comprehension, through interactive listening sessions.

##### Age range  
4–6 years

##### Completed by  
Early childhood educators, special educators, literacy specialists, literacy coaches, speech-language pathologists, paraprofessionals, teacher aides, classroom volunteers

##### Time commitment  
Each listening session takes approximately 10–15 minutes. Children have 3 sessions a week for 26 weeks, listening to the same storybook/narration 3 times.

Reading success starts here.  
How do children become successful readers and learners? It’s a story that starts in their earliest years, when they acquire the language and literacy skills they’ll use for the rest of their lives. Sometimes, though, the story gets off track when young children struggle to learn and understand new words. Intervene early and keep these kids from falling behind with **Story Friends™**, a fun and engaging language intervention program for 4- to 6-year-olds.

Through 26 interactive storybooks about funny, relatable animals, Story Friends effectively boosts the early language skills that predict success in reading. The program encourages active response: each storybook provides up to 20 opportunities for interaction, as children answer vocabulary prompts and comprehension questions. Not only does Story Friends introduce children to [challenging new words](http://archive.brookespublishing.com/documents/Story_Friends_Why_These_Words_Summer17.pdf)—from _enormous_ to _exhausted_—it also helps kids master key concept words like _high_, _low_, _many_, and _few_, which will help them learn new academic content faster and easier. And through the lessons woven into the animals' vibrantly illustrated stories, children strengthen other important skills, such as solving problems, empathizing, working together, and making friends with others who are different.

### Benefits

- **Gets children ready to read and succeed** in school by addressing predictors of reading success  
- **Gives children the foundation they need** to “learn new concepts through literacy while learning how to use literacy to learn.”— _Nickola Wolf Nelson, Ph.D., CCC-SLP, BCS-CL, Professor Emerita, Western Michigan University_  
- **Hooks young attention spans** with fun illustrations, appealing animal characters, rhyming text, interactive story components, and lively narration from Wanda the Word Wolf  
- **Helps children learn critical social and emotional skills**, including empathy and cooperation  
- **Answers the call for research-based interventions**—Story Friends was developed by leading early childhood researchers  
- **Fits into your existing schedule** and requires no special training

### Developers

- [Howard Goldstein Ph.D., CCC-SLP](http://products.brookespublishing.com/cw_contributorinfo.aspx?ContribID=1047&Name=Howard+Goldstein+Ph.D.%2c+CCC-SLP)  
- [Elizabeth Spencer Kelley Ph.D., CCC-SLP](http://products.brookespublishing.com/cw_contributorinfo.aspx?ContribID=78839&Name=Elizabeth+Spencer+Kelley+Ph.D.%2c+CCC-SLP)

## What You'll Need

### Story Friends™ Classroom Kit

[View in Store](http://products.brookespublishing.com/Story-Friends-Classroom-Kit-P963.aspx)

#### Includes

- Teacher Guide  
- 3 complete sets of 26 storybooks  
- USB with the audio tracks  
- Set of 18 shrink-wrapped picture cards

### [Story Friends™ Specialist's Kit](http://products.brookespublishing.com/Story-Friends-Specialists-Kit-P964.aspx)

### [Story Friends™ Storybook Set](http://products.brookespublishing.com/Story-Friends-Storybook-Set-P962.aspx)

### [Story Friends™ Teacher Guide](http://products.brookespublishing.com/Story-Friends-Teacher-Guide-P961.aspx)

### [Story Friends™ sampler](/content/resource-library/story-friends-sampler/index.html)

Download the sampler to learn more about Story Friends, a literacy intervention focused on improving oral language skills for preschool and kindergarten children. This sampler includes program benefits, research behind…

[View Resource](/content/resource-library/story-friends-sampler/index.html)

### [Research behind Story Friends™](/content/resource-library/research-behind-story-friends/index.html)

Read about the research evidence and pilot studies behind Story Friends, a literacy intervention focused on improving oral language skills for preschool and kindergarten children.

[View Resource](/content/resource-library/research-behind-story-friends/index.html)

### [Story Friends frequently asked questions](/content/resource-library/story-friends-frequently-asked-questions/index.html)

What areas of oral language are addressed in the intervention? How were the words in the Story Friends program chosen? Discover the answers to these and other frequently asked questions.

[View Resource](/content/resource-library/story-friends-frequently-asked-questions/index.html)

Story Friends is easy to implement, with no specific training needed. All the instructions to the children are provided in the pre-recorded audio narration.

### [Strategies for encouraging reading readiness in young children](/content/resource-library/strategies-encouraging-reading-readiness-young-children/index.html)

Do you have children in your program that struggle with oral language skills? The developers of the Story Friends and PAth to Literacy intervention programs present how to help improve…