Alumna author pushes children toward literacy

  Courtesy of Patricia Rust Patricia Rust,
president of the Daily Bruin Alumni Association, is behind several
programs aimed at increasing child literacy.

By Sharon Hori
Daily Bruin Senior Staff

When literacy advocate and writer Patricia Rust called the White
House to ask if the President owned a library card, she was not
trying to be funny.

The inquisitive UCLA graduate and current president of the Daily
Bruin Alumni Association was amused by the staff’s
investigative efforts.

“They felt it was an important question and they said they
were working on it,” Rust said, adding that she loves to tell
children this story.

Three weeks later, Rust received a phone call with a final
answer that would have surprised Regis Philbin himself: The
President did not have a library card. But she was assured that all
was well ““ the White House was equipped with its own library.
The response sufficed her curiosity, even though the question still
lingered as to whether or not a library card was required for the
White House library.

  Rust Foundation "The King of Skittledeedoo" introduces
children to the fundamentals of language in a fun and creative way.
Deemed persistent and optimistic, Rust has justified reasons to
care about the government’s collection of tomes. From renting
a video to ordering a burger at McDonald’s, the award-winning
television and film writer gives credit to literacy for providing a
smoothly run society. And if politicians, she said, are to
construct the scaffolds on which adults and children stand, surely
they must advocate literacy as well.

“There’s such a wealth of lives to be lived and for
people not to realize their full potential is nothing less than a
tragedy,” Rust said. “Reading may be admittedly
difficult, but it is clearly the most important thing a child can
do.”

With such patience and initiative, readers will not be surprised
with Rust’s latest mission: to encourage a love for reading
for children nationwide.

Within the past year and a half, Rust has met with state
politicians to gain support for her mission. Governor Jim Geringer
of Wyoming showed his support by sitting with inner city youth
during Rust’s reading of her first children’s book,
“The King of Skittledeedoo.”

“It was interesting to see that politicians were regular
people who were supposed to represent us. Everyone wants their
children to read, so let’s make the politicians do their job
because we’re paying for it.”

“The King of Skittledeedoo,” which was published in
March 1999 by the recently established Rust Foundation for
Literacy, dwells on a playful rhyme scheme to entertain children
and introduce them to the structure of language. The imaginative
world Rust creates through her work sets her ideal learning
environment for children to grasp the fundamentals of reading.

Her book tells the story of a king who flees his castle wearing
only a towel when a sudden fire taunts his land. His people, unable
to recognize the naked king without his robes and jewels, test his
basic knowledge and insist that a man who cannot spell
“mother” or “Skittledeedoo” cannot be their
leader. Nevertheless, the kindhearted populace adopt the man and
teach him the power of reading, writing and spelling.

“It’s the first children’s picture book that
celebrates the joy of reading and addresses the issue of
literacy,” Rust said. “I read a lot of children’s
books but I was frustrated at the books that would only have one
word on a page. I wanted to put as many words in to get as much of
a story out.”

Picture books, which Rust argues are visually stimulating
resources comparable to action films, have provided society with a
pleasing illustration and less challenge to think. With films,
viewers will flock to theaters with the temptation of seeing
explosions, battle scenes or stuntman Jackie Chan, whereas
subtitled scripts require more effort to fulfill the same
entertainment value.

Now with the Internet offering an archive of reading material,
Rust hopes that her Web site, www.powerforkids.com, will further
encourage her audience to explore literacy. Her site extends a hand
to children and parents beyond the book, featuring interactive
links in which children can practice writing their own sentences,
color and cut their own paper crowns and get reading tips from the
King himself.

The Rust Foundation, which took over publication of “The
King of Skittledeedoo” in order to send copies to as many
schools as possible, also hopes to make teaching kits, containing
instructional videos, audio tapes and learning exercises, to
supplement learning in language arts.

“I think I’m able to feel their pain or feel their
frustration or sense what their needs are,” Rust said.
“Having spent a career in journalism and entertainment, I
just felt that words have so much power, and rather than look at
these literacy statistics and get bummed out, I can do something
about it ““ as can everyone else out there.”

The bottom line, Rust said, is that reading is only half the
battle to showing children how to face challenges with confidence
and poise.

“Children can master some of the reading skills, becoming
so empowered that their self-esteem rises dramatically. As their
self-esteem increases, their self-definition increases. When kids
communicate and express themselves, that gives them power to be
more confident,” Rust said.

“When children see an example of parents reading, they
learn to put pictures with words and they hear a word in context
and they learn the meaning of it just by being around parents.
Those children learn to read faster and better,” Rust said,
adding that children are never too young to be read to ““ even
when they’re still in the womb.

In return, the greatest satisfaction in learning to read comes
from seeing the children successfully pronounce words.

“Sometimes they’ll pretend to read. They’ll
tell you the story and paraphrase everything, but you know
eventually that they understand the story and that the desire is
there,” she said. “And that’s the best
part.”

FOUNDATION: For more information on the Rust Foundation go to
www.powerforkids.com.