I spoke a little too fast yesterday about community leaders lack of knowledge about the reading level of parents. After I wrote my post, I read an article in the Tallahassee newspaper from the St. Pete Times. In the story,a principal invited 10 parents to have dinner with him. Five came.
The purpose was to increase parent involvement. But, what I really liked was that he gave the parents a clear set of instructions on how to interact with their child. It wasn't how to be the child's teacher. It was about listening to their child and demonstrating an interest in their learning. The article clearly indicated that the principal understood that it was possible that some of the parents couldn't read. How did he know? He grew up in such a family!
So, what is family literacy? A FL program has 4 components: 1. child learning 2. parent learning 3. parenting in the context of helping their child learn and last, but certainly not least 4. parent and child together time (PACT) When a parent takes his child to the library and the child plays in the library, browsing books and the parent goes along with the child... Guess what that is a family doing PACT, but it is often a middle class mom or dad with their child. PACT is what the principal was modeling! More about family literacy....
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