Family literacy is a form of literacy education that places an emphasis on bringing reading into the home and turning it into a family activity where children and parents learn together, states The Ohio Literacy Resource Center.  The rationale for this theory is that parents are their children’s first teachers.  Family literacy programs provide parents with instruction in parenting skills, as well as parental support on how to create family interactions that are educational and productive.  In essence, these programs help to provide children with developmental experiences needed to achieve literacy success.

Family literacy programs work with the entire family unit or individually with parents to aid in building the literacy skills of parents, in addition to providing forms of social capital.  In order to have fruitful outcomes, programs modify their family literacy programs dependent on cultural norms of participants and needs of the community. Family literacy programs fall under the Adult Education and Family Literacy Act, Title II of the Workforce Investment Act of 1998 and aim to integrate the following:

1. Interactive literacy activities between parent and child.
2. Training in parenting activities.
3. Literacy training that leads to economic self-sufficiency.
4. Age appropriate education to prepare children for success in school and life experiences.

According to a study conducted by the National Center for Education Statistics, children that come from homes with a high level of literacy display higher levels of reading skills and knowledge than their counterparts from homes with a lesser level of literacy.  Latino parents oftentimes do not have the social capital or higher education necessary to support the learning and academic needs of their children. This is where family literacy programs come into the picture, as they focus on literacy strengths and promote parental involvement in their children’s education, since parental involvement influences academic success.

As it is imperative that parents take part in providing their children with a strong language foundation, The Latino Family Literacy Project offers family literacy programs specifically tailored to Latino parents.  These programs provide parents with skills needed to assist their children in achieving strong reading and comprehension skills.  Hispanic parents can teach their children literacy skills by reading bilingual books in Spanish and English, such as those published by Lectura Books.