CHAPTER ONE: BACKGROUND TO THE STUDY
2.6 Family/ intergenerational literacy
2.6.2 Classification of family/intergenerational literacy
According to Balatti and Falk (2002) and Schuller et al (2002 cited in Kerka 2003) intergenerational learning creates conditions that help develop the building blocks of social capital in that it: extends, enriches and reconstructs social networks and builds trust and relationships; influences the development of shared norms and the values of tolerance, understanding and respect; and affects individual behaviours and attitudes that influence community
participation.
Others like Hanks and Icenogle (2001) point out that knowledge has for time immemorial been transmitted from one generation to another through history, often informally or incidentally. This is true when we make a specific
reference to traditional and indigenous education that used to take place in Africa. Omolewa, et al (1998) for instance argues that traditional education recreates society and makes its knowledge applicable to the dynamics of community development. Msimuko (1987 cited in Omolewa, et el 1998, p.22) summarises the values and functions of traditional education to include:
enabling man to lead a more satisfying and productive life, conditioning the very survival of the society and its cultural identity, preserving the cultural heritage and transmitting codes of good conduct and fostering obedience, unselfishness, and the endurance of hardships. Traditional education actually shares some of these characteristics with family literacy.
ii) Indirect Adults - Indirect Children: This has voluntary attendance, short term commitment, and less formal learning through literacy enrichment events/activities such as story telling, reading aloud to the children etc. Generally, reading skills are not directly taught although adults may receive literacy tutoring
iii) Direct Adults - Indirect Children: In this type of programme, adults are given literacy instruction, often in seminars or workshops and they may receive coaching on reading with their children and other activities that influence children's literacy; and
iv) Indirect Adults - Direct Children: In-school, preschool, or after school programmes develop children's reading skills. Parents may be involved in workshops.
Nickse (1990 cited in Kerka 1991) re-classifies intergenerational literacy programmes into two main groups. These include the type of programme intervention in which we have direct or indirect interactions and the type of participation in which we can have adults alone, children alone, and adults and children together.
Accordingly, the adult literacy programme of URLCODA fits into the one in which there is direct interactions and the type of participation in which adults and children are together. Kentucky's Parents and Child Education (PACE) and Kenan Trust Family Literacy Programme implemented in the United States in 1986 are typical examples of the "adults and children together" type of intergenerational programme.
The programme was located in elementary school and offered intensive instruction 3 days per week and 6 hours per day for 9 months for parents lacking High School Diplomas and their 3 and 4-year old children. Through this intensive model, parents and their preschool children received adult basic education skills instruction, preschool education and parenting education. This also included parent-child together activities.
Heberle (1992 cited in Connors 1996, p.104) reported that the results of PACE on a sample drawn from those who took part in the programme were
positive. He found out that parents' expectations for their children's future education improved, parents' literacy levels improved and children's learning skills improved.
Also the Kenan Trust Family Literacy Project operated by the National Centre for Family Literacy replicated PACE throughout the United States and
investigation of the effects of the programme on parents who took part revealed positive changes. Parents who completed the programme reported that they experienced changes in many areas of their lives. For example, many were proud of themselves for the first time and no longer afraid of challenges, many now read more, used the library, and had hopes for their own future education; many were able to help their children with home work, read more to their children and use more positive discipline techniques. The teacher rating of the children whose parents participated in the programme indicated that most were doing as well as or better than other students in their class and most were ranked in the upper half of the class.
It can therefore be said that the last 40 years has seen the emergence of more systematic and formal intergenerational programmes with the growing recognition of their integral relationship to lifelong learning and social
purpose. It should also be acknowledged that in such programmes, both formal and informal learning takes place
It is the inspiration from the success of the above intergenerational
programmes that I am inclined to think that URLCODA's programme has a potential that needs to be exploited. This is based on the relative merits of such programmes and the role parents and adults play in shaping the future education of the children. For example, Duffy (1992 cited in Connors 1996) suggests that parents indirectly influence their children's learning through the
new attitude and the new skills that the adults introduce into the house and into the patterns of family interactions. He adds that if parents' beliefs about the importance of education increase, then parents will communicate a more positive attitude towards education to their children.
For Loewen (1996), effective intergenerational activities have learning inherent in themselves. According to him, learning as a social activity results from drawing on and building social capital through interactions with others.
Various Studies by Loewen, Kaplan and Graniville (cited in Kerka 2003) suggest that effective intergenerational learning: fulfils age-appropriate developmental needs of youth and adults; is intentional, relational and reciprocal (drawing on the strengths and assets of each generation); creates a community in which learning results through collective engagement in authentic activities; prepares the young and the old for participation; and uses the strength of one generation to meet the needs of the other
Adams (1990), Mason and Allen (1986 cited in Jordan, Snow & Porche 2000) and Snow, Burns & Griffin (1998) argue that many accomplishments during preschool and Kindergarten years are strongly related to the later success in conventional literacy tasks. These early accomplishments include: skills directly related to literacy like letter identification, reading environmental print, phonological awareness, oral language skills, and skills in understanding and producing extended discourse. This is possibly why Auerbach (1989);
Fingeret (1991); Isserlis (1990) and Nickse (1990) maintain that family literacy programmes need a holistic approach, which can only be achieved through collaboration between several agencies and multi disciplinary staff.
Parents must also be partners in the collaboration
Purcell-Gates and Dahl (1991) maintain that children who arrive in first grade with more knowledge of letters, deeper phonological awareness, greater familiarity with environmental print, the ability to recognise sight words with greater speed and accuracy and with larger vocabularies are more likely to
learn to read without difficulty Kerka (1991). Intergenerational or family literacy programmes are intended to improve the literacy of educationally disadvantaged parents and children, based on the assumption that improving the literacy skills of parents results in better educational experiences of their children. It should be noted here that whereas most family literacy
programmes involve children with their parents, those offering opportunities for children and adults who are not biologically related are rare. It would be important if such opportunities were developed and encouraged so that its impact or benefits would not be limited to adults and their biological children only.