Literacy… This Project and Why it Matters…

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I chose to focus my project on the topic of early childhood literacy, specifically with providing ways for parents to get involved in the process of developing literacy skills and providing literacy intervention techniques in the home. Frequently, parents have limited time to spend with their children at home, and are for understandable reasons, are not always keeping their child’s literacy at the forefront. Additionally, some parents have limited literacy skills themselves, or otherwise feel less than confident about helping to provide support to their children in the literacy arena. In these instances, it is commonly understood that the schools and libraries in the child’s life will take care of filling this role as literacy advocate for the child. While it is certainly the case that schools and libraries do a lot to work with children on building literacy skills and intervening with additional education and support when needed, parents and other caregivers need to fill in the gaps.

I have always been a big fan of library family story times, as it helps form connections between families and libraries. They expose children to reading and literacy-related activities, and they give parents some ideas on how to read to their children and practice other literacy-building activities at home. However, many times, the focus on literacy ends with the story time. Parents and caregivers are sometimes at a loss to figure out how to continue the learning and engagement with literature beyond the library, in their homes. My project aims to help give parents the support they need to engage in these types of activities in the home, thereby increasing the exposure that their children have to literacy activities. This will ultimately work towards higher literacy rates in children.

My project idea was to combine library family story times with an online tool that would provide additional activities and ideas that could be used once the story time was over. I chose to use Pinterest as the online tool, because it is visual, engaging, can encourage a community among users, and is currently enjoying immense popularity. Visual online tools seem to generate a lot of excitement because they do not contain a lot of words to read, and are generally pretty user-friendly. Users click on images they like, and they are directly linked to the content with that image. It is a great way to visually put together a group of websites that contain ideas a user would like to try, or activities that they want to remember to go back to. This ease of use is very engaging for users, and there are also Pinterest tools and web browser add-ons available that enable users to create their own pins for their boards. In this way, Pinterest also encourages a community among users with similar interests. This is of particular interest to this project, as a group of parents interested in increasing their child’s literacy skills would be able to find each other on Pinterest and share ideas. Finally, Pinterest has many users and is very visible in the current culture. This makes it likely that parents are either already users, or would know someone who could show them how to use Pinterest. This helps the library reach out to several parents, including those who may be on Pinterest, but are not able to attend the family story times at the library.

Research has shown that early childhood literacy programs and interventions are very important to the ultimate overall literacy level of a child. A Jumpstart Survey indicated that “73% of Americans wrongly believe that if children enter kindergarten unprepared, they will catch up in elementary school” (Kniffel). Unfortunately, schools are so underfunded in the current economic situation, that this sad statistic is even more of a reality. Teachers are not able to give each child the literacy intervention they need, and that is why parents need to step in. Libraries can and should provide support for parents in this arena.  Library support for parents means “being able to confidently access appropriate books for children enables parents/ caregivers to build resources and become familiar with books that have the potential to support early literacy” (Allen). Further, libraries, with trained and skilled library workers, are at a place to provide such a resource. “The provision of access to learning resources, including games in digital formats, is a library literacy practice that embeds myriad learning opportunities” (Stooke) and this is essentially the basis for this project. It is important for parents to help their children build literacy skills, but it is also important for libraries to support parents.

Allen, Nola, and Caroline Barratt-Pugh. “Making a difference: findings from Better Beginnings a family literacy intervention programme.” The Australian Library Journal 60.3 (2011): 195+. Academic OneFile. Web. 5 Nov. 2012.

Kniffel, Leonard. “Jumpstart Survey Exposes Literacy Gap.” American Libraries 40.11 (2009): 20. Library Literature & Information Science Full Text (H.W. Wilson). Web. 5 Nov. 2012.

Stooke, Rosamund K., and Pamela J. McKenzie. “Under Our Own Umbrella: Mobilizing Research Evidence For Early Literacy Programs In Public Libraries.” Progressive Librarian 36/37 (2011): 15-29. Library, Information Science & Technology Abstracts. Web. 5 Nov. 2012.

photo credit: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Writing

Annotated Resources

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“Activities – Helping Your Child Become a Reader.” ED.gov. U.S. Department of Education, 2003. Web. 29 Oct. 2012. <http://www2.ed.gov/parents/academic/help/reader/part5.html>

This is a great website published by the U.S. Department of Education that introduces parents to literacy-building activities they can do with their children. It is especially helpful because activities are sorted by age group. It also encourages parents to do simple, yet ultimately effective, activities with their children starting from birth.

Chamberlin, Jamie. “Bringing Books to Life.” Monitor on Psychology 43.9 (2012): 40. Web. 30 Oct. 2012. <http://www.apa.org/monitor/2012/10/books.aspx>

This article gives information from psychologists on ways to help support and encourage beginning readers, specifically in low-income families. It outlines how psychologists involved with the EMERGE reading intervention program have been working with teachers and helping low-income parents choose books to read to their children.

Chrisler, Alison, and Thomson Ling. “What Works for Early Language and Literacy Development: Lessons from Experimental Evaluations of Programs and Intervention Strategies.” Child Trends Fact Sheet 18(2011): 1-11. Web. 29 Oct. 2012. <http://www.childtrends.org/Files/Child_Trends-2011_06_10_FS_WWLanguage.pdf>

This is a fairly short fact sheet that introduces and evaluates several different literacy improvement and intervention programs. This is a fairly informative fact sheet, and indicates that most intervention programs generate mixed results and that more research is needed on programs such as these. It is also noted that supporting parents through literacy intervention training resulted in a positive impact.

Hill, Mary. “Sharing with Parents What We Ask Children to Do.” Currents In Literacy 2.1 (1999): n. pag. Web. 30 Oct. 2012. <http://www.lesley.edu/academic_centers/hood/currents/v2n1/hill.html>

This is an article written by a former elementary school teacher, who informs fellow educators why it is important that they meet with parents to discuss what they are doing with children at school regarding literacy development. She asserts that through sharing this information with parents, a stronger message is sent that parents, teachers, and children must all work together to build and develop literacy skills in children.

McKeta, Pam. “Seeking Help for a Struggling Reader: 8 Steps for Parents.” Reading Rockets. WETA, 2012. Web. 30 Oct. 2012. <http://www.readingrockets.org/article/643/>

This page outlines steps that parents can take if they have a struggling reader. It does not give tips on how to help a child read so much as interventions that parents should make sure are happening with their child, and how they can get extra help for their child in and out of school. While this may not be relevant to all parents with young readers, it is a good resource for the “next steps.”

Parlakian, Rebecca, Claire Lerner, and Janice Im. “Getting Ready to Read: Helping Your Child Become a Confident Reader and Writer Starting from Birth.” Zerotothree.org. Zero to Three, 2008. Web. 29 Oct. 2012. <http://www.zerotothree.org/child-development/early-language-literacy/cradlingliteracy_ready2read_8-14-09.pdf>

Zero to Three is a national organization that works with professionals, policy-makers, and parents in helping to improve the lives of babies and toddlers. This particular publication empowers parents to help their child with early literacy skills beginning at birth. This is very well laid out, and includes activities as well as what developmental milestones are happening for the child each year.

Schmitt, Maribeth Cassidy, and Anne E. Gregory. “The Impact of an Early Literacy Intervention: Where are the Children Now?” Literacy Teacher and Learning 10.1 (2005): 1-20. Web. 29 Oct. 2012. <http://readingrecovery.org/images/pdfs/Journals/LTL/LTL_Vol10_No1-2005/LTL_10.1-Schmitt-Gregory.pdf>

This is a follow-up to a study that examined lasting effects of Reading Recovery. Children were examined after 1, 2, and 3 years after the intervention took place. The results indicated that children were reading at or above grade level at the time of the checkpoints after the initial intervention. This article is particularly good at explaining the importance of early literacy intervention.

Senechal, Monique. “The Effect of Family Literacy Interventions on Children’s Acquisition of Reading.” LINCS. National Institute for Literacy, 2006. Web. 29 Oct. 2012. <http://lincs.ed.gov/publications/pdf/lit_interventions.pdf>

This is a report on a literature review that was conducted to find out if parental involvement in literacy development and intervention is effective. It covered three different types of interventions, and found overall that parents can help their children learn to read, but that the amount of success varies according to the type of intervention strategy used.

“Videos for Parents.” Center for Early Literacy Learning: CELL. Center for Early Literacy Learning and the Orlena Hawks Puckett Institute, 2012. Web. 29 Oct. 2012. <http://www.earlyliteracylearning.org/ta_pract_videos1.php>

This website is a collection of videos for parents that introduce literacy activities that can be done with children. Videos are fairly short and include videos in the categories of “Daily Routines and Literacy,” “Child Interests,” and “A Parent’s Role.” Video viewing is available for faster online speeds as well as low bandwidth, which makes them accessible to parents in a variety of Internet access situations.

“What Works: An Introductory Teacher Guide for Early Language and Emergent Literacy Instruction.” Famlit.org. National Center for Family Literacy, 2009. Web. 29 Oct. 2012. <http://www.famlit.org/pdf/what-works.pdf>

This guide is based on the National Center for Family Literacy report on developing literacy in early childhood. An overview of that report is included, as well as different methods of instruction. A strong message of parental involvement in literacy development runs throughout this guide.

 

photo credit: http://www.guibord.com/

Opinion Posts

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1st Opinion Post (504 words):

I began this project recalling a family story time that I created and performed for a small, local public library as part of a service project for one of my undergraduate classes. As a working mother of a very young child, I was disappointed at my library’s lack of story times in the evening. I felt that, even though I was reading to my child at home, that we were missing out on additional literacy and learning opportunities. For my project, I instituted a family story time that took place in the evening, so that working parents were able to bring their children. The librarian was cautiously optimistic about the project, saying that it was a good idea, but warning me to not get discouraged if we did not see very good attendance over the 8-week course of the project. The first week was indeed pretty sparse, but attendance really took off after that. There were usually at least 8 children with one or more parent figures (sometimes grandparents came, too) each week, and I heard many of the adults say how grateful they were to have a program like that. I was so happy to have all of those children able to participate in the story time, and at the time I was content with focusing on the story time books and activities that I was introducing. Turnout and participation was good, and I was getting good feedback from the children and parents. I did not think about other ways to engage with the parents to make sure that the learning and literacy activities were going on beyond the scope of the library story time.

When I began thinking about this project, I went back to how great it was to be able to provide another opportunity for parents to engage in literacy-building activities with their children, and wanting to do even more. I considered how I could use an online tool to allow parents to take information related to the story time home with them. I initially considered creating a blog, with each post detailing the story time books and activities, and then offering further activities for that topic through posting instructions for activities or links to other websites that had those activities. However, I know that parents do not always have a lot of free time to spend reading a blog, so I wanted something that would be a little faster for them to use. The recent immense popularity of Pinterest made it seem like a good tool to look into for this purpose. It is based on images, so a parent could find something they thought looked interesting and be directed to that page with one click. Words are kept to a minimum, so parents should be able to quickly look at options and choose which ones they want to pursue with minimal time. The popularity of Pinterest also makes it likely that parents will already be familiar with it, or will know someone who knows how to use it.

2nd Opinion Post (513 words):

As I was doing research on early childhood literacy intervention to find support for this project, and as I was creating boards on Pinterest, I thought about possible issues that may arise with the use of this technology tool in particular, and with the use of technology tools in general. First, there is the obvious implied expectation that patrons will have adequate access to the internet. Another, slightly less obvious, expectation is that patrons will be able to access and use the material pinned to the Pinterest boards once they have internet access. While I mentioned at the outset of this project that I expected Pinterest to be popular enough that if patrons did not know how to use it, they would be able to find someone who did, I neglected to fully consider different types of libraries and library patron groups. While it is likely that a library without the targeted patron group of parents with children would not participate in a program such as this, it is certainly possible that a parent’s main internet access might come from a smaller library with an older demographic. This would make it more likely that the parent may not be able to find someone at that library to help them use Pinterest if they were not already familiar. A library that uses this program might consider offering instructional sessions on how to get the most out of the online component to the story time, in this case, Pinterest. Printing, which is needed to use some of the activities that are linked from the Pinterest boards that I created, is another potential issue for patrons for similar reasons. Libraries creating their own Pinterest boards would need to take this into consideration for those patrons who do not have access to printers outside of the library.

Furthermore, libraries would need to take into consideration the learning curve associated with any kind of technology, and the likelihood that its patron base has adequate access to it. If a patron feels that they do not have time to learn how to use the technology, it is less likely that they will be interested in actually using it. Would their lack of interest in technology-related skills impede their child’s literacy rate? While literacy in the areas of reading and writing for children is what this project is aimed at, it requires that the parents have, or be willing to acquire, a sort of technology literacy. Would parents who do not have technology skills feel that the story time portion of the program would not be useful to them? Hopefully not, as any exposure to reading and literacy activities is a step in the right direction for children, but this is something that libraries must take into consideration. Even though this project is aimed at increasing parent and caregiver access to literacy activities, which will ultimately work towards helping their children become better readers and writers, libraries must not forget that access issues are still present, and to not let this initiative become exclusive to any one group over another.

3rd Opinion Post (521 words):

Now that the project has come to as much of an end as it can, for this type of program will always be evolving based on an individual library’s needs and patron groups, several ideas have emerged about implications of a program such as this, as well as ways to take this program even farther. First, early childhood literacy intervention is so important. Many of the articles I read while researching this topic mentioned that it is possible to approach literacy intervention too late, although I am of the personal opinion that adults should never give up on educating children and helping them to become more and better. Additionally, nearly all of the research that I did indicates that children have much higher literacy rates when their parents or caregivers are involved in the process at home. Early childhood literacy must not be something that is only accomplished at nursery schools, daycare center, and libraries. Parents must get involved in supporting their children through this monumental task. Some roadblocks, such as a parent’s lack of confidence in their ability to help their children with literacy interventions, are present. However, a program such as this, where a library works to provide literacy activities, but also supports parents by supplying them with additional literacy tools, will do much to help parents feel that they can and should be practicing literacy with their children every day. While there are certainly accessibility issues regarding internet access and the ability to effectively use these tools, libraries can also support their patrons by providing instructional workshops or other assistance with learning such skills.

Pinterest allows users to “re-pin” pins and ideas, and it also has the capabilities for groups or individual users to add pins to a single board. There are also tools available through Pinterest, as well as add-ons available through various web browsers, that allow for the easy creation of pins from different websites. Using these tools and functions, the library is in a good place to promote a sense of community among parents interested in boosting their children’s literacy at home. Pinterest is free to use, so patrons could set up their own accounts, post different ideas to each other’s, or the library’s, boards and also use ideas that other parents have posted. When I think about teaching young children, I tend to think that the more opportunities we have to introduce new material in different ways, the better. So while the aim of this project is to increase early childhood literacy through the use of a library story time and an accompanying Pinterest account, the resulting community of parents with the same interests is likely to add ideas and materials to carry this out. This program would need to have an evaluation component to see how it is reaching parents, and thus children, and to work on what needs are not yet being met through the story times and Pinterest boards. An additional evaluation of how accessible these materials are for parents and caregivers would also be an important step in making sure that this program is reaching the maximum amount of people.

 

photo credit: http://serc.carleton.edu/sp/library/writing_assignments/index.html

Bedtime Reading Tips

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Bedtime Reading Tips
Compiled by Dianne Ochiltree (Author of LULL-A-BYE, LITTLE ONE)

Reading to a child for just ten minutes a day not only instills an early love of reading, it also offers a rare opportunity for parents to bond with their little ones. But in today’s busy world, how do you make the time? At bedtime! Bedtime is the perfect time to leave the day’s hectic schedule behind, and to share a cuddle along with a book.

The good news: you don’t have to be a professional storyteller to engage your “audience.” To help you get started, here are a few hints that will give you confidence and point you in the right direction:

  1. If you have an active child (and who doesn’t?), why not sing, dance, clap, tap, and otherwise jiggle out all the wiggles first? When your little one is ready for quiet, one-on-one time, bring out the books.
  2. Create the perfect environment for a little ‘we’ time. Make sure that the lights and room temperature are ‘just right.’ Snuggle close with your child as you read together. Invite your little one’s favorite blanket or toy to join you!
  3. Talk about the book. Ask simple questions, such as: “what is the bunny wearing? Was that a silly thing to do? Where do you think the puppy is going?”
  4. Act out the story using different voices for different characters. Use a whisper or loud voice wherever it fits with the story.

Other Helpful Suggestions:

Look for books about things that interest your toddler or preschooler: trucks, insects, dinosaurs, kittens, superheroes…whatever! Find some books that your child can hold and touch. Interactive books, with pop-ups or fuzzy-felt characters, can help with a child’s sensory development.

Choose books that YOU enjoy reading, too. Why not share some of your old favorites from your childhood? Make it fun for you both, and you’ll go a long way toward creating a bond that could last a lifetime!

Picture this: use the book’s pictures to build your child’s vocabulary. Point to objects on the page and name them. If this is a book you’ve read a few times before, ask your child to name some things, too.

Counting fun: you can also use the illustrations to introduce numbers and counting. For example, you might count “blue things” or “round things” on the page.

A chorus line: young children naturally love rhythm, rhyme and repetition. If the story rhymes, ask your child to guess the last word of the next line, or repeat a refrain. Very soon, she may be saying it without prompting at the right point in the story.

Reading to a child for just ten minutes a day not only instills an early love of reading, it also offers a rare opportunity for parents to bond with their little ones. But in today’s busy world, how do you make the time? At bedtime! Bedtime is the perfect time to leave the day’s hectic schedule behind, and to share a cuddle along with a book.

For more information on ways to improve your read-aloud skills and for a list of recommended books to read on the subject, visit www.ochiltreebooks.com.

Source: http://www.ochiltreebooks.com/Bedtime-Reading-Tips~72.aspx

photo credit: http://www.skiptomylou.org/2007/12/20/traditions/

Pajama Party

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Literacy Ideas for a Pajama Party:

  • Have children pretend to sleep. They can only wake up when you say two rhyming words.
  • Introduce their buddy, telling its name, where they got it, and if it sleeps with them.
  • Use flashlights for reading and darken the room.
  • Make nightcaps and decorate them with pictures of dreams they’ve had.
  • Read “There’s a Nightmare in My Closet”. Draw or paint nightmares and put them behind a door (with a knob that opens.
  • After reading “Ira Sleeps Over”, discuss what Ira would pack–children could even draw pictures on a suitcase shape paper.
  • Following the reading of “Goodnight Moon”, reinforce rhyming words by making a collaborative class book and having each child complete and illustrate a page saying, “Goodnight to the __________ and goodnight to the ____________.”
  • Read “The Napping House” and have the students put the characters in order on a bed cutout.
  • Read and talk about nocturnal animals. Sort animal pictures by diurnal/nocturnal.

Source: http://www.littlegiraffes.com/pajamaparty.html

photo credit: http://www.embracinghome.com/kids-pajama-party-ideas/