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Encouraging Parents And Children: Children learn first and foremost from their parents. In this respect all parents are teachers - and very effective teachers they are. Arguably, children learn more from their parents in the first five years of life than they do from their schools in the next ten. This book is about parents and teachers working together to help children with their learning; more specifically, it is about parents co-operating with teachers over their own children's reading. We have chosen the term PACT (Parents, Children and Teachers) to embody this concept.
In questions like these, common sense and good teaching coincide. They can also be fun, for parents as well as children. More than anything else, a good book is something that parents and children can enjoy together. Teachers have undoubted skills and experience that most parents do not have; parents have the advantage of emotional bonds conducive to learning that schools can never provide to quite the same extent. Thus parents' work complements that of teachers - and children receive the benefit of a partnership between what are, after all, the most important adults in their lives.
A primary cause of language retardation among disadvantaged children is the lack of reinforcement of their use of language. Parents can advance the linguistic development of their child through a willingness to converse with him. By asking questions of the child, reacting to his statements, and encouraging parents and children him to "think out loud," parents can reinforce and reward the child's use of language and aid in its further development. |
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