In Novel Md. Program, Children Help Parents Learn English

This is probably fun for the children and also gives them good practice in their own English.   - - Donna Poisl

By ZAINAB MUDALLAL

ASPEN HILL, Md. (Nov. 29, 2013) -- Playing the role of the teacher is not a game of dress-up for 10-year-old Giselle Jimenez. Her English is stronger than her mother’s, Maricela Cabrera, 35, who often needs Giselle’s guidance on homework assigned in a family literacy class they are taking together.

Cabrera and Giselle are teaming up to learn English in a course offered by the Literacy Council of Montgomery County, a novel, inter-generational approach to helping adults with low levels of literacy learn English, by making their children the teachers.

U.S. Department of Education estimates show that 11 percent of Maryland adults aged 16 or older lack basic prose literacy skills — the ability to read and answer questions about readings. With a lack of funding in adult education making it difficult to address the problem, groups like the Literacy Council are filling the gaps left by schools.
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