https://doi.org/10.1177/0961000619882751 Journal of Librarianship and Information Science 2020, Vol. 52(3) 905–915 © The Author(s) 2019 Article reuse guidelines: sagepub.com/journals-permissions DOI: 10.1177/0961000619882751 journals.sagepub.com/home/lis Introduction Access and exposure to books and stories 1 has been estab- lished as crucial for children’s early literacy skills (Evans et al., 2010; Neuman, 1999). Furthermore, research has found that providing exposure to a variety of genres – such as storybook, non-narrative informational, and narrative informational (see Table 1) – and diverse titles is important for supporting different aspects of early literacy skills and later literacy achievement (Isbell et al., 2004; Pentimonti et al., 2011; Robertson and Reese, 2017). Despite these findings, children often lack exposure to a wide variety of literature. Instead, they are only exposed to a limited genre and title diversity in home and school read-alouds (Robertson and Reese, 2017; Yopp and Yopp, 2006). This may be in part because home and school literature collec- tions are often smaller, and more limited, due to cost and available funds. Because of this, children in lower socio- economic classrooms and homes may be exposed to even less variety than that of their peers in higher socioeco- nomic neighborhoods, possibly contributing to already existing gaps in literacy and school readiness skills between these two groups of children (Neuman and Celano, 2001; Neuman and Moland, 2019; Wells, 1986). Additionally, while inclusion of diverse 2 characters and plot elements in published children’s literature has increased over time (Horning et al., 2019), and campaigns like “We Need Diverse Books” have increased awareness of the issue (Mabbott, 2017), it may be that the same limi- tations that affect genre exposure for young children also affect exposure to recently published titles that are more inclusive of diverse peoples and experiences. Public libraries are one resource that can provide greater exposure to a variety of genres and diverse titles, especially for those in lower socioeconomic neighborhoods, given that the library collections and literature-based programs are open to all and offered free of charge (Howard, 2013). Public library storytime programming, in particular, offers an opportunity to share stories with young children (birth to 60 months) and their families that they may not have exposure to otherwise in their homes or early childhood classrooms. In addition, storytimes have been found to provide play-based environments that are rich in early literacy and learning opportunities for both the children and their families (Campana et al., 2016; Goulding et al., 2017; McKechnie, 2006). To do this, storytimes have become multimodal learn- ing environments that use stories, songs, rhymes, games, and more to support learning (Campana, 2018; Stooke and McKenzie, 2009); however, stories remain a core piece of the storytime learning experience (Campana, 2018). 3 Sharing stories: An exploration of genres in storytimes Jacqueline Kociubuk and Kathleen Campana Kent State University, USA Abstract Exposure to a variety of stories can support many early literacy skills for young children. Using video recordings from a previous study that examined early literacy in public library storytimes, this study investigated the use of genre and story variety in storytimes for young children (birth to 60 months). Findings showed that attendees were primarily exposed to stories from the storybook/ narrative genre with limited use of both non-narrative and narrative informational genres in number of stories and time spent reading each genre. Story variety and the use of current titles can be improved to better support early literacy development in public library storytimes. Keywords Early childhood, early literacy, genre, public library, storytimes Corresponding author: Jacqueline Kociubuk, School of Information, Kent State University, 1125 Rinsman Drive, Kent, OH 44242, USA. Email: jkociubu@kent.edu 882751LIS 0 0 10.1177/0961000619882751Journal of Librarianship and Information ScienceKociubuk and Campana research-article 2019 Article