West campus news Releases Archive

ASU's Sascha Mitchell-Kay discovers indicators of family literacy problems

Nov. 22, 2005

Adult women learners, who otherwise had little opportunity to practice literacy skills, participated in a family literacy program in northern California called Even Start. For these women, most had not earned high school diplomas, many were discouraged by family to seek additional learning, and all were learners of English as a second language. Sascha Mitchell-Kay, an assistant professor of elementary education in the College of Teacher Education and Leadership, has produced a comprehensive study of the effects of the program on both the women and their children. Her research uncovers many of the problems preventing women from seeking learning opportunities and reveals how the program has bettered their lives.

Even Start is a federally-funded family literacy program that operates in hundreds of cities nationwide, including Phoenix and surrounding areas. The program develops a parenting model that compliments existing parental practices and provides men and women the opportunity to discuss real-life issues while also increasing their command of the English language through both reading and writing. The northern California Even Start program, over the three years Mitchell-Kay studied it, had only one male participant in its duration. Therefore, Mitchell-Kay’s study focuses on adult women learners, specifically.

“For me, it was very moving to hear the women talk about how inspired they were to have personal goals,” said Mitchell-Kay. “It was like a dam was breaking. They had been looking after others their whole lives, and now they were told they could do something. That was a pretty remarkable finding, and I credit the program.”

All of the women participating in the Even Start program were at or below the poverty level and had at least one child under the age of eight. Many were from arranged marriages. The women came from a wide variety of places, including China, Japan, Afghanistan, Cuba and Bosnia. The children of these women who were not yet school-age also attended the program in a preschool setting. According to Mitchell-Kay, a main reason these women initially joined the program was so they could be better equipped to help educate their children. In addition, they hoped to achieve personal goals and better their self-confidence as learners.

“Adult learners, particularly women learners, have complex needs that extend beyond their role as parents,” added Mitchell-Kay. “Women learners need more opportunities to achieve their personal goals within the context of family literacy programs.”

Mitchell-Kay revealed three principal findings of her study:

• Mothers acquired specific parenting and literacy skills through participation in the family literacy program. They transferred these skills to the home environment through planned, daily interactions with their children.
• Mothers developed personal learning goals through participating in the program, as well as a stronger sense of self-confidence and a stronger support community outside of the family.
• Mothers’ ability to pursue personal learning goals was constrained by excessive demands on their time. Teaching children school-based skills at home added to the mother’s responsibilities.

The program itself consisted of a four-day school week with English language classes three of the days and a parenting class one day. Many of the class discussions dealt with real-life issues, such as how to obtain a driver’s license and how to apply for health insurance. The program required the women to take home literary tasks to their children, and they had their own literary tasks to work on, as well. It focused on the idea that literacy is intergenerational and that parents are their children’s first teachers.

Even Start programs, such as the one in northern California, continue to operate at a nationwide level. For more information on such programs, visit http://www.evenstart.org.

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