Today’s parents have a lively interest in. assisting their children as learners, and this interest has spawned a plethora of books on home reading programs. It's natural to raise this question, then: why yet another book for helping children read at home? Surely the bookstore and library shelves are groaning with volumes that can help you create a "home schoolroom," enough to produce a nation of advanced readers. Why yet another book? For good reasons, believe me. Obviously, most parents want to help their children learn. A couple of years ago, Professor Joyce Epstei at Johns Hopkins surveyed the parents of more than 250 Baltimore children. Her findings, reported in The New York Times, showed that kids had higher reading scores if parents supported their youngsters' efforts at home. What's even more interesting is that although mothers and fathers wanted to involve themselves actively in their children's learning, very few knew just what to do. A shocking eighty per cent reported that they didn't have a clue about where to begin in helping their children succeed in school. With this apparent insecurity, many moms and dads are reaching for books in an effort to learn what they don't know. Hence, all the how-to-helpyour- child read productions. However, unlike Any Child Can Read Better, most "home learning" books address parents of toddlers and preschoolers and attempt to create a race of superkids who can read almost before they can walk. Teach-your-child- to-read books concentrate on turning the home nursery into a classroom—reading drills with flash cards, oversized words pinned as labels on familiar objects, interminable sessions on alphabet skills, phonetics, sight vocabulary, and sounding-out words. Too many books for parents of young learners have turned on the pressure and have turned off the pleasure for mothers and fathers as guiders and shapers of learning experiences. Moms and dads are not drill sergeants. Home isn't boot camp. If you're the mother or father of a preschooler, unless you're home learning parents who won't send your children to school in any case, don't teach your son or daughter how to read.
Parental Involvement and Reading-Related Activities of Struggling Readers of English as a Second Language
