Family Reading Workshops

Education begins in the home.

The Orange County Literacy Council provides free Family Reading Workshops in our community because we recognize that parents are a child’s first and most influential teacher and that families are the foundation for growing literacy skills in multiple generations.

Family Reading Workshops are highly interactive workshops designed to encourage and support parents as they read and do other literacy-related activities with their young children. The Literacy Council partners with established parenting groups in the community such as Head Start to provide services to pre-identified parent populations that want to strengthen their family’s cycle of literacy.

Workshops can be presented as stand alone sessions, however, whenever possible, parenting groups are encouraged to host a series of four related workshops. The workshops will empower parents, particularly those who do not have strong literacy skills themselves, to read regularly and often to their children. Trained volunteers and Literacy Council staff will facilitate the workshops and coordinate working with the host sites to make sure that childcare, transportation, and interpretation are available as necessary. A new children’s book is given to each participant.

Our Family Reading Workshops use a combination of portable library, practice reading sessions, role play, and videos to promote daily reading for families with busy lives. The workshops benefit people at any literacy level, as we always include a variety of text-free materials. Our target population is parents and caregivers of children under the age of six.

Please contact Kelly Davis at kdavis@orangeliteracy.org if your organization is interested in hosting one of our free parent workshops or if you are interested in volunteering!

Learn more about Family Literacy

 

Workshop Descriptions

Family Reading Workshop
Part One (1 hour)
This initial workshop emphasizes the importance of reading to young children and provides strategies to make reading together more fun, interesting, and convenient.

Family Reading Workshop
Part Two (1 hour)
This workshop refreshes the skills learned in the initial workshop, while adding information on everyday reading. We discuss how to use environmental text (bus routes, words on trucks, food items) as an opportunity for learning.

Family Reading Workshop
(1 ½ - 2 hours)
This workshop is combination of Family Reading Workshop Parts One and Two.

Making a Treasure Book for your Child
(1-2 hours)
An arts and craft adventure, this workshop teaches parents how to make picture books for their children - a perfect activity for a rainy day. Each parent receives a gift bag of goodies, such as stickers and pens and glue sticks, to finish the book with their children at a later time.

Something to Talk About
(1-2 hours)
This workshop focuses on language development. We present a short video and then through a series of role-playing activities we work with parents to learn to develop language skills during daily activities. We use the CAR approach: Comment, Ask Questions, Respond by Adding a Little More.