Since its founding in 1974, Julie’s Family Learning Program has emphasized family literacy as a crucial component of family development. Family literacy programming help parents improve both their parenting and literacy skills while empowering them to provide literacy skill-building opportunities for their own children. The net result is enhanced literacy skill development in all members of the family.
Through adult classes and mother & child activities times, Julie’s goal is to encourage and develop a love for learning, and to stimulate mother and child to continue to look for new ways to learn together. Extensive research indicates that literacy activity interactions between parent and child at the infant, toddler, and preschool stages equips the child with basic cognitive oral and language skills that are integral for success in school. Julie’s interactive family literacy curriculum engages parents and children in goal setting, family projects, digital literacy, shared cultural experiences, problem solving strategies, and critical and creative thinking. Monthly interactive literacy projects involve various themes that are planned and discussed in the adult classes and then engaged in jointly by mothers with their children. Family activities include, but are not limited to, monthly reading and/or craft activities, family literacy field trips to recreational and cultural events, and the publication of a family newsletter, “The Write Stuff,” which is a compilation of writings from parents and children.
An emphasis on reading readiness not only imparts to the child a familiarity with books and an appreciation for uses of literacy, but it also creates a home environment in which literacy is valued. As the child becomes proficient in reading and begins to face new educational challenges, the parent is motivated to keep pace in order to provide support and encouragement, which has been proven to be an effective catalyst for parents to pursue further education and job training themselves.
