by Apryl Veld - Omineca Express
Vanderhoof Library will hold a Pajama Party on Thursday, January 16, from 5 - 7 p.m. to celebrate Family Literacy Day in Canada. Pizza will be served and activities are planned for all ages.
The theme this year is "Journey to Learning".
They advise anyone wanting to attend to get an RSVP pass soon from Vanderhoof Library, as space is limited and tickets are going fast.
The ABC Life Literacy Canada group recently commissioned a poll of Canadian families about their learning habits. 62 per cent of Canadian parents don't feel they have as much times as they would like to spend helping their children.
"When we asked them about doing learning activities around home, only about 30 per cent said they did," said Life Literacy president, Margaret Eaton, "they pointed out time being a problem."
Eaton said she wondered if people thought they were talking about opening a text book on the kitchen table.
"That's not our idea about learning," she clarified.
What Life Literacy is trying to get across is making fun and creative ways for learning and teaching that can be incorporated into daily life that don't always need extra time.
"When you're grocery shopping, cooking and doing laundry," Eaton suggested, can be good times to learn with kids. She also suggested using time in the car to do learning activities, maybe to memorize times tables or to play word games.
Some fun learning activities can be as simple as cooking with kids.
Cooking involves reading, have the children read out the ingredients while you gather them, or the other way around, Eaton said.
Also, doing laundry involves reading washing instructions, while folding involves matching colours. Many games incorporate counting, reading and planning strategies.
Life Literacy's website offers people tips on easy learning for daily life. It also posts literacy events and a "Journey to Learning" passport anyone can download with ways to learn at home, in the community and through the media with suggested activities.
Eaton added that her own family learned how to play cribbage last year to celebrate literacy day, since math literacy is also important.
Find Canadian literacy day information on the web at http://abclifeliteracy.ca/