Lindsay McHolme is the Community Literacy Liaison at the Literacy Center of West Michigan. Over the past few years, she has been involved in improving literacy in the community as a Volunteer Tutor and Literacy Coordinator for the Literacy Center's Adult Tutoring Program.
As Community Literacy Liaison at the Literacy Center of West Michigan, Lindsay McHolme is involved in affecting improved literacy in Grand Rapids. She writes about organizations that provide literacy in the community.
"Bate, bate! Chocolate!
Stir, stir! Chocolate."
Urizar De Leon, a Family Literacy Program participant, chants this rhyme, followed by its English translation. He is one of 52 adults enrolled in the Family Literacy Program, a collaboration between
Kent County Head Start and the
Literacy Center of West Michigan that provides high quality education for children and free ESL tutoring for parents.
"Our program helps foster quality bonding time in families by teaching parents how to embed reading in their families' daily lives," says Literacy Coordinator Shay Kraley. "(It) helps our families be better connected to their children's teachers and schools, which can be especially intimidating for low-literacy, foreign-born speakers."
Family Literacy Program activities like Family Literacy Nights also "help foster quality bonding time," Kraley adds.
Originally from Guatemala, De Leon and his family have been involved with the Family Literacy Program for over two years. De Leon and his wife, Esmeli Gramajo, have three children, who range from one to four years of age. They learned about the program when their daughter, who attends Henry Head Start, brought home a flyer about it.
At a monthly Family Literacy Night, I chatted with the De Leon-Gramajo family to find out more about their experience in the program.
"When Esmeli started with her tutor, she didn't know any English except for the numbers," De Leon tells me. "Now she understands almost everything. It's good because sometimes I'm not around to interpret for the family."
Gramajo meets with a volunteer tutor weekly and attends Family Literacy Nights once a month. She says her goal is to improve her English skills so that she can help her children in school.
"I bubble over with enthusiasm after my sessions with Esmeli," says Sue Rabick, Gramajo's tutor. "Esmeli is very interested in learning new words and pronouncing everything correctly."
After a dinner of turkey wraps, potato salad and shamrock-shaped cookies, Head Start staff lead separate literacy activities for children and parents. I sit in on the parents' workshop.
"We work with our families to enhance their literacy because we believe the parents are the children's number one teacher," says Education Manager Kari Clark.
Education program coordinator Melissa McIntyre reads nursery rhymes from
The Itsy Bitsy Rhyme Book. De Leon interprets them into Spanish for her, and then he reads Spanish language rhymes aloud. We learn that rhyming, because it is playful, is a great way to interest children in reading.
"Our curriculum is based on play," McIntyre explains. "Children learn through play."
A long table behind McIntyre is filled with craft supplies like felt, cotton balls, colored tape and scissors. Head Start staff next lead parents in making puppets to go along with the rhymes in the
Itsy Bitsy book.
"All the activities we do here at family activity night are based on activities that you can do with your children to help enhance their literacy as well as your own," says McIntyre.
Head Start gives each family a copy of the
Itsy Bitsy book, so that parents can practice what they learned making puppets and reading together with their kids at home.
The De Leon-Gramajo family isn't the Family Literacy Program's only success story. Literacy post-tests show that 90% of parents and every child demonstrated improvement in 2010.
It goes to show that family literacy is making a difference for families in our community.
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