Excerpts from Reflective Journals | Excerpts from Literature | References

Very few aspects of teaching are as rewarding as knowing that your students feel safe and comfortable in your class. From day one, work to have students realize that you are there to act as a helpful resource to them, and that their fellow students are to be looked upon as a support group of learners.When students know one another within a class, and can call each other by name, and relate to classmates' experiences, many barriers to learning are removed.

Excerpts from Reflective Journals

• April 2nd, 2002 (Wave I) – “We got in some great practice reading and working with specific words…and just simply building confidence. This is something I have noticed over and over with my students. They doubt their abilities to learn. Marisol, for example, is often commenting on how she is older, and she wonders if she’ll really be able to learn anything ever. Much of my role includes supporting and cheering these adult learners along the path of learning!”
• May 14th, 2002 (Wave II) – “As I asked for reactions to some of the things we read, David commented on how his father was a good example of helping them learn, informally, as they were growing up. He would do many crossword puzzles and get his children excited about helping him—in that way they learned many words. Also, David commented a bit later that he agreed with the idea that those children who are read to learn to read faster and better than the rest. He shared again how growing up his family would read the scriptures together every day and even the little ones had to try to read and participate. His father insisted that they pronounce things well, learn how to look up as they read, and pause in the appropriate places, etc. He said that it bothered him as a child, but then when he got into school all his friends had to spend time really practicing those kinds of things—even to the extent of having to read paragraphs over and over—out loud—for homework. David didn’t really have to ever do that, because he’d learned those things at home with his family. Excellent!!!! That was a great experience to share—and the others really seemed to appreciate it as well.”
• May 30th, 2002 (Wave II) – “We began as usual with our routine of asking about words that have been found over the course of the few days since we last met. This seems to be something that they really enjoy, even if they are not gaining a mastery of these words right now, they are being validated in their questions, and I can tell they feel like our classroom is a safe environment in which to ask questions.”

Excerpts from Literature

• Neuman, Caperelli, and Kee, 1998, “Whether or not they achieved their academic goals, their [class participants’] reasons for staying were of a more personal and social nature…The development of social networks was especially integral in retention, a purpose for staying in itself. Parents spoke of being isolated, trapped in the home, and enjoying the stimulus of a literacy program” (pp. 246–247).
• Neuman, Caperelli, and Kee, 1998, “Thus, although their reasons for initially attending family literacy programs might have reflected the learning of basic skills of literacy, parents’ reasons for staying were defined far more broadly. They stayed because they were provided with opportunities that supported their goals, gave voice to their needs and social practices, and seemed to enhance their personal growth as well as that of their children” (p. 247; emphasis retained).
• Handel, 1999, “Interpersonal motivations were at work in participants’ responses to Family Reading. Foremost was the welcoming atmosphere… Overall, the enjoyable and informal nature of the Family Reading workshops helped in recruiting and retaining participants” (pp. 58–59).
• Handel, 1999, “For the mothers, a valuable meaning/motivation of the [Family Reading] program lay in social relationships, and those social relationships facilitated their engagement with literacy and the valuing of literacy. For the teachers…literacy development was the goal and the social-support aspects more of a means to that end. Later, they came to be viewed seamlessly, as part of an integrated whole” (p. 105).
• Paratore, 2001, “[We] have learned that projects such as the ILP [Intergenerational Literacy Project] can make a difference as they help parents to construct meaning with other adults, with their children, and with their children’s teachers” (p. 111).

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