To be successful, individual family literacy programs must also be tailor-made to fit the context and the culture of the participants. To fully support children and adults, family literacy programs can work in partnership with existing community services to make a wide range of services easily available to families. Support services that remove barriers to participation in programs most commonly include transportation, meals, health care, and counseling. Also, cooperative arrangements with other service agencies can result in referral networks that further support families by helping to foster self-sufficiency. Samantha's mother is improving her own academic skills while her daughter benefits from learning in a quality preschool setting.
Time is allotted for all of the parents in the program to participate in a group discussion.
Sometimes, they talk about parenting issues, and at other times, they share their interests, their fears, or their goals for a better life. The principal of a school with a family literacy program says that he has not seen a program yet that can match this one in repairing negative feelings about school or in providing positive ways of looking at education for both the children and adults. Meta Potts, Ed. D., is the Director of Training and Staff Development at the National Center for Family Literacy. Continue to next article. Child Care Bulletin Contents Page.