A number of projects recognise the valuable role families, parents and siblings have to play in improving the literacy skills of students at school. Below is a range of projects selected from the many different approaches that have taken place around the country. 

Dads and family literacy Liverpool Parent School Partnership Ethnic minority and EAL initiatives Information from the database

More information on family literacy

Dads and family literacy

The majority of family literacy programmes have traditionally attracted more mothers than fathers, many for the simple reason that they have taken place at school during the day, thereby excluding working fathers (and mothers too). Some family literacy initiatives have been aimed specifically at dads.

Cambridge Regional College, with money from the Adult and Community Learning Fund planned a project to involve men in their children's learning. The college conducted a survey to find out what fathers and grandfathers would like to attend. Sport was particularly popular, so a key skills/sport workshop was set up. Fifteen men signed up, each with two or more children, for a two hour session. Adults and children warmed up together with a sport activity and then split into two groups. The children completed sport-related worksheets and word and number games, while the adults completed sports related tasks such as pulse taking, weighing and measuring etc. Both groups came together to finish with a game related to the leaning tasks completed separately. The course covered numeracy and literacy and gave parents ideas of how to play/work with their children. The college gained a commendation in the Campaign for Learning-ELS Adult Learners' Week competition in 1999. A fathers and son's reading group has been set up in Test Valley School Library. The group meets every half term, in the evening, in the school library, to discuss a new selection of library books. Selected titles are read and reviewed by dads and sons together after a brief introduction from the group leader, who is head of Hampshire Children's and Schools Library Services and who helped initiate the project. The reviews are printed and circulated free to Hampshire libraries with additional reviews and comments from author/illustrator Anthony Browne and his 16-year-old son. The boys' preferences have convinced the school librarians taking part that schools need to buy more adult titles.

Liverpool Parent School Partnership 

The Liverpool Parent School Partnership is a city-wide service that incorporates a number of different initiatives. The family literacy project has been running since 1995 using the model developed by the Basic Skills Agency. It is now run for key stage 2 children, those with additional needs and their families, and bilingual families. It runs in more than 43 schools working with more than 476 families from nursery to Year 7. Accreditation (Merseyside Open College Network) is available for communication skills and for a new course funded by the European Social Fund; Parents as Educators. This course gives parents information about the literacy hour and presents ways in which parents can support children in their learning.

Liverpool Hope Community College leads an initiative, REACHout to Parents, with the Parents School Partnership. This aims to develop a curriculum focusing on family issues at pre-Access, Access and Degree level.  Different modules called: 'Our family matters' are designed to start participants off on their own discussions and debates and lead (if desired) to nationally recognised qualifications. There are plans to attach this programme to the LEA's family literacy programme. From September 2001 a single honours degree will be available in Family Studies.

Article from Literacy Today 
Reaching Out to Parents Lyn Carey describes the Liverpool Parent School Partnership

Rochdale's Partnership Education Project has three strands. It involves a team of family literacy workers in schools, a learning support team working with families with pre-school children, and a team of three literacy teachers. The family literacy workers are based in nine primary schools in Rochdale. All are bilingual and work with families and schools to increase parents' involvement in their children's learning. The learning support team workers are seconded from Rochdale Metropolitan Borough Council, Rochdale Healthcare Trust, and the voluntary sector (Barnado's and the Children's Society). They operate in a number of settings including baby clinics, playgroups and community centres; and work with parents and pre-school children. This work includes a Bilingual Bookstart project for babies at 7 to 12 months. The Middleton Literacy Project provides extra teachers for three primary schools. They will be trained in Reading Recovery methods and also work alongside parents and the community to improve literacy standards. It is hoped to include a Bookstart project for babies. More Rochdale projects

In Birmingham,The Nelson Mandela Community Primary School runs a family literacy project. The target population arises mainly from Pakistani and Bengali parents whose children attend the school. The project emphasises the role of parents as educators. It also capitalises on the role of older siblings as potential tutors. To encourage this, the school holds award ceremonies during whole school assembly at which certificates are presented to mark the level of proficiency achieved by younger siblings.   

The English Language Support Team (Warrington), ran a parent-child language project which encouraged mainly Muslim mothers with pre-school children to attend a local community centre once a week to foster language, play and social skills. ESOL tutors from Warrington Collegiate Institute and NACRO offer support.   

In London, The City Literary Institute Parent Education Unit, The Centre for Language in Primary Education (CLPE) and The Language and Literacy Unit have set up projects involving Parents and Children Together (PACT). The projects have developed in three ways: book-making for parents with their children; training sessions for parents; and counselling/advice sessions for parents on issues relating to their own or their children's education. New initiatives include Caribbean Writers in Residence programmes, and working with siblings in schools.   

The Oxford City ESOL Project runs a family literacy project in partnership with East Oxford First School. The focus of the project is on pre-literacy and beginning literacy skills, for a group of mothers who have had very little or no experience of schooling in their country and therefore little or no literacy skills in their mother tongue. The mothers acquire literacy skills in English alongside their children.   

Evesham Open Access Project - Family literacy need not be with older children, it can be with mothers from birth onwards. Evesham Open Access Centre is involved in a project with Wallace House Community Centre, called Partners in Learning. The course targets expectant mothers and mothers with young children. It aims to give these parents ideas about educating their children from birth onwards. The women are also improving their literacy and numeracy skills, as well as learning ways to stimulate young children.