Discussion Announcement

Are you interested in discovering some practical examples of ways to extend your adult students’ reading experiences, while at the same time providing them with some strategies they can use to support their children’s literacy development? If so, please join our upcoming discussion on the Family Literacy List.

Guests Discussion Leaders: Dianna Baycich, Literacy Projects Coordinator, the Ohio Literacy Resource Center, Kent State University and Barbara Van Horn, co-director of the Institute for the Study of Adult Literacy and of the Goodling Institute for Research in Family Literacy in the College of Education, Penn State University.

Description

Adult learners learn best when there is a purpose for their learning. Their learning is magnified when it is transferred home and used to support their children’s learning. Dianna Baycich and Barbara Van Horn will present some strategies for using authentic resources effectively to help parents support their children’s literacy development and to help parents build their own reading skills. Our guests will discuss using authentic texts for parent involvement and adult reading instruction. For example, using three National Institute for Literacy Publications—Shining Stars, Dad’s Playbook and Big Dreams—our guests will discuss how parents can apply what they learn in their parenting and adult reading class to activities to do with their children at home.

Guest Biographies

Dianna Baycich — Dianna is the Literacy Projects Coordinator for the Ohio Literacy Resource Center at Kent State University. She has worked in adult literacy for 17 years and has presented at national adult and family literacy conferences. She received her Ph.D. in adult literacy from Kent State University.

Barbara Van Horn — Barbara co-directs the Institute for the Study of Adult Literacy and the Goodling Institute at Penn State University. She has a Masters in Education in Reading and has worked in adult and family literacy since 1973. She works with Dianna Baycich on the NIFL LINCS Basic Skills Collection and is particularly interested in how adults' reading skills can be developed within meaningful contexts, such as child development.

To Prepare for the Discussion

You may want to review the publications that will be used as resources in this discussion.
There is no charge for these materials. The following descriptions are from the Edpubs Web site.

Shining Stars
Describes strategies proven to work by the most rigorous scientific research available on the teaching of reading. These publications provide parents with ways to help their toddlers through second and third graders learn to read; they includes activities parents can use to build reading skills and a checklist of developmental skills parents can apply to their children. There are five booklets:

• Shining Stars: Toddlers Get Ready To Read: How Parents Can Help Their Toddlers Get Ready To Read
• Shining Stars: Preschoolers Get Ready To Read: How Parents Can Help Their Preschoolers Get Ready To Read
• Shining Stars: Kindergartners Learn To Read: How Parents Can Help Their Kindergartners Learn To Read
• Shining Stars: First Graders Learn To Read: How Parents Can Help Their First Graders Learn To Read
• Shining Stars: Second & Third Graders Learn To Read: How Parents Can Help Their Second & Third Graders Learn To Read

Dad’s Playbook: Coaching Kids to Read
Provides information about the importance of teaching children to read, and how fathers can use simple skills to help their children be even better readers. This publication describes some strategies proven to work by the most rigorous scientific reading research available on the teaching of reading. This publication includes stories about how 20 different fathers are helping their children learn to read.

Big Dreams: A Family Book About Reading: Preschool Through Grade Three
Informs parents about the importance of reading and teaching their young children to read. The brochure provides this information in the format of a story that the family can share together. This Partnership for Reading publication describes strategies proven to work by the most rigorous scientific research available on the teaching of reading. Information on how to download or order additional copies of this publication is also provided.

The publications may be downloaded in PDF format. If you would like hard copies of the publications, they may be ordered through edpubs at http://edpubs.gov/ or by calling 1-800-228-8813 (TDD/TTY1-877-576-7734), emailing edpubs@inet.ed.gov, or faxing 1-301-470-1244.

Last updated: Wednesday, 15-Jul-2009 14:56:59 EDT