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WILL Book Mentoring Serves 578 Families
WILL trained parents of children in the Champaign Early Childhood Program to become classroom book mentors and beginning in January, they began going into classes monthly to share a book and related activity with the children.
The addition of the early childhood program to the project means WILL is serving 578 families with its book mentoring project. Volunteers from the community are joining parents as book mentors at the early childhood program, and also visiting classrooms as book mentors in Head Start classrooms in Champaign, Rantoul, Savoy and Urbana.
At the Champaign Early Children Program, having parents in the classroom is proving valuable not only to students and teachers, but to parents themselves, said Molly Delaney, WILL’s educational outreach director. “Parents have been so enthusiastic,” said Molly. “The project gives them a meaningful way to contribute to their child’s school. It creates a feeling for parents that they have a stake in their child’s education.”
After each mentor visit, every child in the classroom gets to take home a copy of the book that the mentor read to the class, and children are encouraged to ask someone at home to read the book aloud.
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