Family Literacy Resources

The Practitioner Toolkit: Working with Adult English Language Learners is an ESOL resource with some specific topics related to family literacy.

A collaborative effort of the National Center for Family Literacy (NCFL) and the Center for Applied Linguistics (CAL), the Toolkit “provides needed support and serves as a resource to adult education and family literacy instructors who are new to serving English language learner adults and families. The Toolkit provides a variety of materials to help practitioners begin to meet the language and literacy development needs of the ELL students they serve through the following components: responses to Frequently Asked Questions; a first-day orientation guide; lesson plans; and research-to-practice papers on critical topics.”

Topics of particular interest to Family Literacy providers include:

Part III, Parent Education in Family Literacy Programs, which presents information about parent education as one of the four components of family literacy practice; and Part IV, Topics in Adult ESL Education and Family Literacy, which provides discussion papers for educators who want more in-depth information pertaining to adult ESL education and family literacy.

The National Center for Family Literacy (NCFL) has been given the opportunity to gather success stories from family literacy students across the country. Through these success stories, NCFL will be able to share how students have grown through their family literacy experiences, and how family literacy programs have left a positive impact on them and their families. NCFL will use these success stories in publications and articles, on its Web site and in letters to promote family literacy.

If you are a student and you’d like to submit a success story, go to:

http://www.famlit.org/ProgramsandInitiatives/Dollar-General-Success-Stories.cfm

Students who submit success stories by January 6, 2007, may be chosen to be a student speaker at the 16th Annual National Conference on Family Literacy to be held in Orlando, Florida, on March 4-6, 2007.

Student speakers receive one conference registration, food stipend and hotel accommodations at Disney’s Coronado Springs Resort in Orlando, Florida, for the duration of the Conference. In addition, each student will receive a special gift to enjoy during his/her stay in Orlando.

Other contests will be held throughout the year for student success story authors.

If you have any questions, please contact Ann Reynolds at areynolds@famlit.org, or call 502-584-1133, Ext. 149.

The Goodling Institute for Research in Family Literacy’s Annotated Bibliography, updated monthly, provides annotations of about 200 publications pertaining to family literacy on the Research page.

The bibliography emphasizes the following subject areas: interactive literacy, parenting education, program description and models, curriculum and instruction, collaboration within programs, assessment and evaluation, culture and context, government policy, and professional development. Each annotation is cross-referenced for easy access by the users. New annotations are highlighted in the “what’s new” section of the website home page. The purpose of the annotated bibliography is to advance the work of all those involved with family literacy, by providing a document that synthesizes the research and writings on practices and theory directly affecting family literacy programs. It is intended for program staff, researchers, community leaders, private and public funding agencies, policymakers, and others who want to learn more about family literacy.