Citations

61% of low-income families have no books at all in their homes for their children.

Reading Literacy in the United States: Finding from the IEA Reading Literacy Study. (1996)

The only behavior measure that correlates significantly with reading scores is the number of books in the home.

 McQuillan, Jeff. The Literary Crises: False Claims, Real Solutions.(1998)

In low-income neighborhoods, there is one age-appropriate book for every 300 children. 

Neuman, Susan B. and David K. Dickinson, ed. Handbook of Early Literacy Research, Volume 2. New York, NY: 2005. p. 31 

The most successful way to improve the reading achievement of low-income children is to increase their access to print.

Newman, S., Brazelton, T. B., Zigler, E., Sherman, L. W., Bratton, W., Sanders, J., & Christeson, W. (2000). America’s Child Care Crisis: A Crime Prevention Tragedy.  U.S. Department of Education, ERIC, Washington, DC.