Caskets of jewels and coffers of gold.
Rich than I you can never be-
I have a Mother who reads to me."
-Strickland Gillian
I included the poem above because when I read it on the very first page
introducing this chapter about family literacy partnerships it really hit me
how lucky I was to grow up with parents that did have the time to read to my
sisters and I. If also helps that both of my parents are both educators and
strongly believed in exposing up to a variety of text at a young age. If you
walked in to my twin sister and I's bedroom when we were young we had our very
own bookshelf full of our favorite books. I can remember my sister and I
sneaking books into bed at night even after our parents read to us so that we
could read or tell the story though pictures to each other after my parents
left. My parents caught on pretty fast to our little secret and would come and
check our room to make sure we were asleep instead of reading. Now that I think
back on it at least we were reading instead of playing with the toys in our
room! I also remember always watching my mom especially reading and being
almost envious of her because I wanted to be just like her.
The very first thing that
this chapter talks about is how important it is for families to promote
literacy in their homes and to introduce their children to environment text
whenever possible just like Mrs. Bolton did with the newspapers. Even though I
was lucky enough to have parents who were about to promote literacy at home, it
is not usually the case with most families. “Today, in about 75% of families,
both parents work”. That leaves these parents little time to think about things
like literacy. As future teachers we have to be aware of this and understand
that not all families have the time that they would like to work with their
children on literacy development, especially since they are often more worried
about providing their families with the necessities like food, clothing, and
shelter. It is difficult to try and make some parents understand the importance
in supporting their child in literacy development at home. But it does have to
be done. So as future teacher how would you guys get parent to help support
literacy development at home?
This
chapter also points out the importance of teachers including parents and
guardians on what is happening in the school and how they can help their child.
As a teacher I think that parent involvement in and out of
the classroom is very important the best way to promote that is through open
communication with the parents at all times. Having a classroom that is always
open to volunteers for parties, field trips, to teach about different cultures,
and many other things is one way to get parent involved. In my
EDEL 231 class we talked a lot about this and even made a welcome letter that
explained a little bit about ourselves and our goals for the year, weekly newsletters
that would inform parents on what was going on that week and if volunteers were
needed, and monthly newsletters that indicated the standards students were
going to be working on for each subject area. Page 436 lists 12 different ways
to get family involvement at home and in the classroom. Do you have any other
suggesting’s to getting parents involved in the classroom?
It is so cool that you have such fond memories of your early literacy! I love seeing a children's book and remembering it from my childhood it just makes you feel good! It is definitely a fine line we have to walk to help families who are in need work on literacy with their students. You don't want to tell those struggling families what you are doing wrong and you don't want to come across like you are trying to "fix" them. We have to get really creative as teachers when sending home anything for student to work on with parents. One way I would get parents to help support literacy is to talk about literacy during parent conferences. Explaining that literacy will be a big focus of the school year and maybe sending home materials or strategies that they can do with their student throughout the year if they find some down time. Not requiring parents to do these things just explaining that if they did get a chance to work with their student it can benefit their literacy. Another way I want to try to get parents involved is to send home small family involvement activities that maybe just require the student to ask the parent a question about literacy that prompts discussion. This way parents wouldn't necessarily need to find time to sit down and help students create a project but they simply talk about literacy and the student journals about the conversation. Keeping parents informed on what is going on in class is very important and I have already discussed some good ways to do so in my other classes. One thing I really want to do is have a class website. I want to put weekly updates about what we learned that week and what activities we did. I would also include a section for parents to access if they ever wanted to do extra practice with students. I would also include fun announcements of what is going on in class and pictures of what we did that week. I know that depending on what school I work at I may have to adapt this idea to those without internet access but if I am able to make it work I think it would be a really cool way to keep parents informed.
ReplyDeleteI think it is really amazing that your parents always took the time to read to you and your sisters. For me this is an important part of teaching children literacy and I am also really happy to have had my parents, and even my older brother read to me and my younger brother when we were growing up and I have several fun memories about that.
ReplyDeleteI think that I would definitely do my best to inform all parents about the benefits that it can have to support their children's literacy development. This could be done through news letters or during parent meetings. I also would introduce ideas about how they are able to support their child's literacy development in their every day life. In one of my previous classes we created literacy packets, that the parents in our classroom where able to take home with them for a few days and read the book and do the activity it contained with their child.
Lindsey, I agree with a lot of what you are saying. Parent involvement is incredibly important. Parents and family members are the child's first teachers. I like the idea of having the parents be regular volunteers in the classroom. I think that will definitely get the parents more involved and see what they can do outside of the classroom to help their child's literacy development. Though for some parents who can't come into the classroom that can be hard. If you have parents who work full time and can't take time off to see what their child is doing in the classroom how would you let them know what is going on in the classroom? I think maybe a class blog would be great or newsletter as you said. In the blog or newsletter one can have things to do at home and what they would need for that activity of sorts. That would be a great way to just have the parents know what is going on in the classroom and little ways that they can help the learning along. I also think that just having the books available for the students to maybe bring home or maybe a journal to bring home everyday would be good. Those would be good if the parents aren't there as much, definitely if they work a lot. But, all in all, I agreed with most of what you were saying, great post!
ReplyDeleteThis is an awesome post and i really enjoyed the poem that you put at the beginning of the post. The poem really lets the reader know that family literacy is priceless. If a parent is interested in you academics at a young age it will most likely mean that you will show some interest in academics. I think it is very cool how your older brother used to read to you because its the same thing that i used to do, read to my sister when i first learned how to read. I truly believe that parents should be informed about the material that is being taught at school. Parents are the first teacher and thats how it will always be.
ReplyDeleteI think it’s great that your parents were able to as involved as they were. Family involvement is very important for early literacy. I also would stay up reading. I would be under the covers with a flashlight and read. Apparently, my parents knew but let me read. There were also a bunch of books in my house and my parents and I were often reading.
ReplyDeleteI don’t think there’s much you can do if parents don’t believe in helping their children at home. We can show parents how they can help and maybe have children take home literacy packets that parents can help with.