UH Manoa Center on the Family announces new publication for parents of young children

Raising A School-Ready Child: A Family Guide

University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa
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Posted: Jul 31, 2009

As the final days of summer wane, and recognizing how important a parentʻs active involvement is in a childʻs learning and success in school, the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa Center on the Family has announced a new publication for parents of young children, and the family service providers and educators who work with them. Raising A School-Ready Child: A Family Guide provides useful tips to help parents prepare youngsters for school success.

The publication discusses the essential role that parents play in helping children develop the characteristics, positive behaviors and skills that are needed for success at school, home, work, and in life. These traits are associated with the General Learner Outcomes (GLOs) that serve as the basis for evaluating student performance at all grade levels, and in all academic disciplines in Hawaiʻi ʻs public schools.

Raising A School-Ready Child describes the home-to-school learning continuum, with examples of everyday activities that parents can use to support their childrenʻs early learning, and to promote school readiness.

"Equipping children with the tools they need to succeed in school starts long before the weeks prior to a child entering kindergarten," says Mary Ann Nemoto, project administrator at the UH Mānoa Center on the Family. "The simple things parents do each day with their children are important—such as establishing routines, creating rules as well as consequences for not following them, giving children age-appropriate responsibilities, playing games and reading together, and ʻtalking storyʻ with one another."

Adds Grace Fong, a UH Mānoa professor in Family and Consumer Sciences, "Parentsʻ active involvement in their childrenʻs learning—supported by a strong, positive home-school partnership throughout their years of schooling—is an important element of childrenʻs success in school."

For more information or to request copies of Raising A School-Ready Child, contact the UH Mānoa Center on the Family at (808) 956-4132 or send an e-mail to cof@ctahr.hawaii.edu For other publications on children and families, please go to the Center on the Family website at http://uhfamily.hawaii.edu.

The Center on the Family is a unit within the UH Mānoa College of Tropical Agriculture and Human Resources.