Topic 5: Engaging Families in Reading

Research clearly points to third grade as a watershed moment in children’s education. Third grade reading fluency is highly predictive of children's long-term school success, including high school performance and college enrollment (Lesnick, Goerge, & Smithgall, 2010). Unfortunately, most children are not meeting proficient reading levels by the end of third grade, especially among students from low-income families (Feister, 2010). And although third grade is crucial to reading, the precursors to reading, and more broadly,literacy, actually begin much earlier in life (Whitehurst & Lonigan, 1998).

Parents and other primary caregivers are instrumental in fostering language, reading, and literacy skills so essential for school success (e.g., Caspe, Lopez, & Wolos, 2007). Research points to the positive literacy effects of family engagement at home, at school, and even in out-of-school time (Lin, 2003). Family engagement at home is perhaps the most influential to literacy outcomes and academic outcomes more generally (Shumow, 2010). Specifically, the provision of a literacy-rich home environment-including ample books, frequent and interactive shared reading between parents and children, and rich and frequent discussions with children—predicts language and literacy gains in the early years and early grades, as well as leisure reading habits of older children (Hart & Risley, 1995; Kirsch et al., 2002; Senechal, 2002). Parental help with homework has also been shown to help with language arts skills (Patall, Cooper, & Robinson, 2008).