No hoses were necessary to put out the fire of learning at the Wareham Free Library Tuesday morning, during fire truck Toddler Story Time.

Librarian Marcia Hickey led four families in a story time that focused on fire trucks, firefighters, and fire stations, in honor of National Fire Prevention Month. As she has with every story time, Hickey focused on incorporating a variety of educational tools for both kids and parents.

“I try to do everything educational,” Hickey said. “We do the ABCs, we do counting, we talk about the illustrations, a little bit of structure of a book. … They love to count. They love their numbers.”

The story times also include dancing and movement, music-making, and craft time, towards the end of the session.

Though children are able to drop in on any story time and learn, Hickey said the storytimes build upon themselves, and that she reinforces what the children have learned at each session, and teaches them something new.

“I try to do something different every week, because there is a lot that’s the same, so they feel comfortable,” Hickey said. “They’re learning, and it builds up. And this is a lot of what they are going to do in preschool.”

Hickey also feels the story times are good for busy parents, who may not be able to spend as much time reading to their kids as they would like to, or who may be new parents.

“A big part of this is modeling for parents,” Hickey said. “It’s okay to stop a story, when a child has a question about it, and get back to it. … Because, sometimes, they think you’ve got to read word-for-word from the book. But you don’t!”

Increasingly, Hickey said, she sees grandparents taking the children to the library, because most working parents can’t afford to take much time off work.

“It’s hard with working families now,” Hickey said. “But, as you can see, library programs are going younger and younger, because … the child care leave is small now. It used to be families could stay home with their kids for a couple of years.”

Hickey also said the story times “introduce the families to the library. They see we’re not a ‘shush’-y place, and the kids can have fun.”

“Libraries are a valuable community resource,” Hickey said. “To be able to have the opportunity to offer this to families is a good thing.”

Toddler Story Time is held every Tuesday morning at the library’s main branch, from 10:30 a.m. – 11:30 a.m.