LINCS and Family Literacy

The Literacy Information and Communication System, LINCS, is funded by the National Institute for Literacy. LINCS is a cooperative electronic network of the national, regional, state, local partners. The LINCS Special Collection for Family Literacy is maintained by the Midwest LINCS partner at the Ohio Literacy Resource Center. Visit the LINCS Family Literacy Collection.

The Family Literacy Resource Notebook

One significant resource in the Family Literacy Special Collection is the Family Literacy Resource Notebook (MS Word document) compiled by Connie Sapin and Nancy Padak at the Ohio Literacy Resource Center. The Notebook contains a section on Parent-Child Activities. Following is some guidance on ILA from the Notebook:

The positive interaction of parents and children around learning activities is often the new element added to an existing program to make the transition to family literacy. Sometimes these activities are coordinated with themes or topics in a parent education component of family literacy programs. Parent-child activities take place on home visits with a staff person, on program field trips for participating families, during regularly scheduled time on site, during special events such as school family nights, and informally at home.

Parent-child activities provide opportunities to develop a stimulating home learning environment that helps prepare children for school, to experience discovery learning, and to practice language development and communication skills. As a consequence, parents tend to observe how their children learn through play. Parent involvement in a child’s learning thus expands beyond reading books and checking homework.

The Notebook also contains suggestions for ILA that develop language and literacy in young children and assist parents in using research-based strategies for reading to their children, such as paired reading with school aged children and games that parents and children can play together.