Summary, Questions 8,9: Prison-based Family Literacy, Libraries & Self-directed learning
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Question 8. Bill, John and Steve, I have a question about family literacy. "Locked Up and Locked Out" points out that punishment “is not appropriate for the more than 1.5 million children of prisoners” and that “Neglecting these unintended victims will likely lead to these children replacing their parents in the prisons of the future.” What is being done about this? Can you give us some examples of programs in prison settings that help inmates help their children to read or with their homework, or with other education-related or parenting issues? -- David J. Rosen
Robin Lovrien Schwarz --David-- this reminds me of the work of Ross Greene, who, I believe, works with at-risk young people in Maine. I heard him at an Institute sponsored by the Learning Lab @ Lesley in 2005 in Marlborough, MA. He has written "The Explosive Child" and another about the family. He maintains that punishment more often produces the opposite effect of what was intended and that usually it is about the worst response to outbursts and "bad behavior." I was very moved by his stories about the young people he works with--many of whom are already incarcerated in juvenile institutions.
Carolyn Buser, Education Specialist, United States Department of Education, Division of Adult Education and Literacy -- David -- Maryland has long had family literacy programs within selected institutions. Prisoners who are in the school program are able to bring children in one morning every other month along with the children's' care giver. The incarcerated parent participates in reading activities with the child or children, and the caregivers have a session led by social workers or other professionals on how to help children and themselves adjust to the incarceration of the parent. The program began at the Maryland Correctional Institution for Women in the 1990's through Reading is Fundamental. It has expanded to two men's institutions and has had continued support from Maryland's Correctional Education Program under the Maryland Department of Education. Each parent studies children's literature appropriate for her/his children in advance of the visit, and then each child may select two books to take home. Some of these books are purchased, and others are donated. Last year Maryland's public school teacher of the year made the donation of these books her project for the year. There is nothing quite like watching the commissioner of correction do the hokey-pokey with 25 or so prisoners and their children. Recently the program was awarded a Barbara Bush Family Literacy Grant. A contact for more information on this program is the Correctional Education Librarian, Glennor Shirley, at gshirley at msde.state.md.us. Thank you for an informative discussion.
Donna Brian, djgbrian at utk.edu This is certainly a "feel good" post, Carolyn! Thank you for sharing.
Bill Muth –
Hi Cay! In addition to the notable work being done in Maryland, four other examples follow. It would be wonderful to hear from others about their family literacy work programs. (a) The Hudson River Center program mentioned yesterday. (b) The Hope House DC program, which uses videoconferencing to support regular (biweekly) father-child contact. In addition to videoconferencing, letter writing, taped storybook readings, and poetry workshops are used to support and build relationships. (c) Reading-Is-Fundamental programs, like those Cay Buser mentioned, are now in at least a dozen federal facilities (and I am aware of similar programs sponsored by the Virginia Department of Correctional Education.) Typically, in these programs, incarcerated mothers and fathers tape record their reading of a storybook and the tape and book are sent home to the child. R-I-F (wisely) requires that these mailings happen regularly, so an individual child can expect a series of books over the course of a year. (d) An e-mail pilot program that the Federal BOP is planning at its female facility in Danbury CT. It will involve the use of carefully monitored e-mail correspondence between incarcerated mothers (who are also enrolled in the literacy program) and their children (who are part of a mentoring program).
Here is some background info on this topic:
1. 55 % of male prisoners are fathers with children under age 18; 44 percent of these fathers lived in the home of at least one of their children at the time of arrest.
2. 75% of all female prisoners are mothers, and 72% were primary caretakers of their children prior to arrest. The number of incarcerated women is expanding more rapidly than that of male incarcerates.
3. Children of prisoners are six times more likely to enter the criminal justice system; the Human Rights Watch (2002) found that African American children were over eight times more likely to do time than Caucasian children, and Latino/a children were three times more likely.
Children separated from parents as a result of incarceration experience higher rates of anxiety disorders, withdrawal, depression, guilt, shame, anger, aggression, school phobias, and poor academic performance. (These problems often started before the mother or father was arrested, parental removal tended to exacerbate them.)
4. About 55% of adjudicated youth have a parent in prison.
5. Some proponents of tough sentencing for criminals challenge the right of prisoners to have contact with their children. But practitioners that work with either the parents or the children or both, report on the need for this contact: (a) for the emotional health of the children (often described as the ?other victims,?) (b) to promote successful reintegration after prison, and (c) to stop the corrosive effects of high rates of incarceration on the community.
The Reentry initiative has nurtured numerous community-prison partnerships, and increased political support for life skills and parenting programs, but I am not aware of nearly as many programs attempting to integrate parenting and literacy. For example, I recently found 1,187 research articles on family literacy, but only 8 of these had anything to do with incarcerated parents. It is not realistic to leave this problem at teacher?s doorsteps. It is foremost a policy issue that touches on a number of concerns that have already been discussed in this forum - pressure to show results (GED), a reporting system that is not sensitive to the kinds of learning that are engendered in intergenerational literacy programs, etc?
Marie Reeves, Logan County Kentucky I teach a parenting and PACT (Parent And Child Together) class in our local detention center. Incarcerated parents attend a one hour parenting class addressing different issues, then child care providers bring their children for PACT. We have had some wonderful success stories as a result of these classes.
Question 9. How to promoting wide reading? M. Gilbert, Arrowhead Correctional Center - General Library I would like to know, from GED, ESL, and/or ABE instructors who work in corrections: What books or other media you would like to see in the correctional library at your facility? I'm looking for specific titles, or general types/categories, that would support your educational program AND be attractive or helpful to adult learners, but still be general enough to justify purchase in a library that must serve the entire facility. I am a correctional library supervisor and Master of Library Science graduate student. I joined this list as part of class assignment, but I also have a professional interest in building a special collection of adult literacy books for the library where I am working (500 bed, minimum-security, all male correctional center). I am also very interested in supporting the educational programs at my facility.
Fiona Murray, Communications/Liaison Coordinator, Movement for Canadian Literacy Ottawa, Canada tel: 613-563-2464, email: Fiona@literacy.ca website: http://www.literacy.ca This is for the librarian in a corrections institution that asked about possible reading materials for her collection. I'm sure you'll already have checked out American materials and other traditional literacy resources (ie. Laubach materials which are sold through New Readers Press in Canada) but I'd like to suggest some resources beyond your borders. Grass Roots Press in Canada publishes a variety of excellent materials for practitioners and learners alike. Their Easy Reader collection goes from readability levels of grade 3 - 5. They are based in Edmonton, Alberta and can be accessed at: http://www.literacyservices.com or call toll-free: 1-888-303-3213. In Britain, they have developed a very successful series of high interest books written by best-selling authors in shorter, easier to read formats. Find out more about the First Choice series at: http://www.firstchoicebooks.org.uk/. They have been created to interest and encourage those in the non-reading population but are being marketed broadly to the general public as popular and affordable literature. Canada is about to embark on a similar initiative called Reach a Reader but nothing is published yet. Also, if your library would like to bookmark an interactive website with great learner materials, try the Learning Edge at: http://thewclc.ca/edge/index.html. There are several issues of this learner newsletter on a variety of topics. Often learners are contributors. The graphics and voice-along option make it quite dynamic.
Eric Appleton, Teacher/Coordinator, The Fortune Society 212.691.7554, x.702, 53 W. 23rd St., 7th floor, NYC 10010, eappleton@fortunesociety.org
Hello everyone, I teach reading, writing and math at the Fortune Society with John Gordon. I have taught here for about seven years. As part of my work, I have done individual intakes with many of the students here. Student after student has told me that they really began to love reading when they were in prison. Not every student who has served time learned to love to read, but many did. It has been amazing to me to see how important books were to these people at hardest point in their lives. I don't want to minimize the work that teachers in prison are doing, but from my vantage point, self-education has been the most important type of education in the lives of most students I meet. I hear students talk about how they began to get interested in history, in science and in reading for reading's sake. I hear about how books became prized possessions and were passed from person to person. I look at the students in our program and wish that they were doing the same thing now, while continuing their studies. For students who are working towards their GED or are hoping to go to college, daily independent reading is essential. Unfortunately, many students drop out of the habit of reading once they get back in the free world, where friends, family and TV lead them away from books. How can teachers on the outside help students retain and continue this enthusiasm for reading on their own and learning for learning's sake? How can prison teachers and administrators encourage (and facilitate) more prisoners taking opportunities to educate themselves?
Bill Muth Eric (and All), I also found that incarcerated people in literacy programs are quite literate. In a study I did a few years back I was surprised to find that, except for participants in the lowest reading group (word recognition scores at about 1st grade level, and very slow reading rates) all others reported reading outside of class as much as 6 hours a week or more. (Even those at the lowest reading levels that had a bit stronger reading rate scores were active readers.) One mother, also in the lowest reading group, regularly wrote letters home in her effort to hold the family together. Another (male) literacy learner, who really struggled with print, said he read (USA Today, magazines) 3-4 hours every night. Not to say that these literacy practices always came easily to them, but their literacy practices certainly defied the stereotypical image of illiteracy!
And I agree they present opportunities for outside of school programs such as book clubs and discussion groups. There is a fathers group at one of our federal prison in Allenwood PA, that formed out of the parenting class. Because the teacher established a culture of dignity and trust, the men began opening up and talking about the pressing issues facing their children, spouses, and parents back home. They found this conversation so helpful they took it upon themselves (with the support of the staff) to create the fathers group that met one evening a week in the school. One of the men told me that he never identified as a father until some others from the fathering group urged him to come to their meetings; now his responsibilities as a father were the defining purpose for how he was doing time. Another told me, the thing he will miss most about prison (miss about prison??) when he goes home will be the support he received from this (fathers) group.
John Linton I noted this posting in the context of another referencing libraries. Access by prisoners to all types of print materials is somewhat problematic in American prisons and jails. While some inmates are able to address some of their educational goals in prison schools -- others don't want to learn that way, can't get into a school program, or want to address legitimate learning goals that are not addressed by prison school programs. The Autobiography of Malcolm X includes a great example of "self education" in prison. I was already in the prisoner education business when I first read it, and found it more than a little humbling. I don't know who, but apparently someone somewhere decided that every American inmate should have virtually around the clock access to television. Unfortunately, access to books, newspapers and magazines is more problematic. Space, staffing, materials, technology and systems of access -- all are issues in the context of prison libraries. Educators need to be strong advocates of library services for inmates.
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