Using data to understand and improve book borrowing for children in Leeds
www.nesta.org.uk/project-updates/using-data-to-understand-and-improve-book-borrowing-for-children-in-leeds/
www.nesta.org.uk/project-updates/using-data-to-understand-and-improve-book-borrowing-for-children-in-leeds/
Working with Leeds City Council, we analysed library data to explore geographic and demographic differences in children's book borrowing and its correlation with NHS speech and language service referrals
Public services such as children’s centres, libraries and Family Hubs have the potential to support children and families in their local communities and, in turn, improve child development. Libraries in particular are a source of books and other resources for children who might not have access to at home, and aim to support language and communication skills through access and information.
During the third year of our three-year Fairer Start Local innovation partnership, Nesta analysed anonymised data from Leeds City Council’s library services to better understand geographic and demographic differences in the borrowing of children’s books, and how patterns corresponded to referral rates to the NHS Children’s Speech and Language Therapy Service.
In 2023 and early 2024, Nesta worked with Leeds City Council’s library services to extract anonymised data on the borrowing of children’s books from the 37 libraries and community hubs across Leeds, including Leeds Libraries’ Story Buses.
These are mobile sites packed with board books, picture books and toys for under-fives that travel to local schools and communities.
Nesta analysed this data to develop a better understanding of:
The ultimate aim was to use these findings to inform future library provision.
Overall, we found that Leeds’ library services are well located relative to the demand for the Children’s Speech and Language Therapy Service and children’s communication and language outcomes at age five in 2022. However, we also identified a small handful of areas in Leeds that had much lower borrowing rates of children’s books compared to the rest of the city.
Several of these areas were also underserved by their current library provision, had poor child communication and language outcomes at age five, and/or had high referral rates to the Children’s Speech and Language Therapy Service. Some of these areas also had local schools that rarely borrowed books from the school library service, a service to borrow books from the library and make these available for their students.
We also found low rates of borrowing for parenting and English as an additional language books across the city. However, this might suggest that these books are being sourced elsewhere.
As a result of our work, Leeds’ library services altered their mobile offer via their Story Bus service to cover underserved areas. As of September 2024, the service takes Story Buses to six new community locations once every two weeks, offering local families the chance to join reading and Story and Rhyme sessions, borrow books, sign up for library membership and activities and other council services.
New locations on Leeds' Story Bus route
Before this analysis, the buses predominantly stopped at early years settings and when they did visit community locations take-up was extremely low. This analysis has enabled the libraries service in Leeds to strategically expand their provision based on the data and evidence about access and need, to cover underserved areas and provide long-term community engagement with their mobile libraries where it can have the greatest impact.
It has been invaluable harnessing Nesta's research and data collected to inform a long-term outreach project with the Story Bus service. Using the research data, I have been able to identify areas of the city that would most benefit from the Story Bus service coming to them.
I am now six months into the six new community stops and I am finding that every visit we are reaching new children and families through visibility and word-of-mouth fostered through our community partner connections in each area. We’ve had some lovely interactions with parents, carers and children that may have otherwise not used the library service, and it’s very rewarding to be able to offer those opportunities.
Sally Hughes, Story Bus librarian
The data analysis and collaboration with Leeds Libraries and the NHS Children’s Speech and Language Service also paved the way for the continuation of our productive partnership work for the third year of A Fairer Start Local. Our year three project, Playful Learning Leeds, continued work with the library and speech and language teams, and colleagues across Leeds City Council, to create a series of playful installations that support the building blocks of early speech and language development within community spaces at the Compton Community Centre and Library in Harehills, Leeds.
