Looking at learning together
Jump start | Looking at learning together | Shadow puppets | Family Learning Information Pack
What is Looking at learning together?
Looking at Learning Together is the name given to a package of interactive resource materials, for use with parents in pre-school settings. The package is divided into six sections, each supporting a two-hour workshop session. The course as a whole can be delivered by pre-school leaders, tutors or other facilitators.
Parents can mean anyone who has care or responsibility for young children attending the pre-school and might include the child's mother or father, or relative such as grandparent.
What does it offer?
Looking at Learning Together promotes and reinforces the principle that education starts in the home at birth and continues through pre-school into formal schooling and then on throughout adult life.
Children develop more quickly in their early years than at any time of their lives. Parents have a central role in providing experiences, in the home and in the course of family life, which help children to develop their thinking skills in language, literacy, maths and science.
How the pack is designed
The package offers a structured course of six sessions and the materials for each of those sessions are in three parts:
- notes for the person delivering the session
- ideas sheets to support the activities
- worksheets for adults
The content of the sessions is as follows:
- Introductory session, in which parents explore what being a parent involves and reflecting on parents own learning experiences and using them to think about what and how children learn.
- How children develop early language and literacy skills.
- How children develop a grasp of early maths.
- The importance of the role of the adult in helping children to learn.
- An understanding of children's behaviour.
- What is next for me and my child - which includes further educational opportunities for parents.
Although each session has a particular focus, a common strand in each session is encouragement for parents to think of themselves as learners and to consider further learning opportunities for themselves.
The pack contains step-by-step guidance for staff who are inexperienced in facilitating group work and who may need support in planning and preparation of the workshops. It gives useful information on resources, which may be needed to help facilitate a session effectively.
Why should the setting get involved with Looking at Learning Together?
This learning pack offers adults the opportunity to improve their knowledge and understanding of how their children learn. It provides them with skills to support their children's learning, both in the home and in the pre-school.
Positive feedback is a key motivating factor in supporting learners in taking new and difficult steps in their learning journeys. This is especially true for parents who have previous negative experiences of education. The content of the pack clearly illustrates the importance of using positive feedback as a method for supporting parents in their learning.
The entire Looking at Learning Together course is designed to give parents positive feedback on their own learning and to encourage them to focus on their future learning.
Courses such as Looking at Learning Together can motivate parents to become involved in their children's own pre-schools, by volunteering to help out with activities. This can lead to other forms of engagement with education and training.
The setting will benefit because parents will have the skills to be more involved in their children's setting. There is evidence to show that children are more likely to succeed where there parents are involved in their education, and where parents are improving their own levels of education.