OSC Report Summary
Operation Santa Claus (OSC) Report Summary
Background
Project Name: “Book Spark: Igniting the Love of Reading for Life”
Project period: January – December 2014.
Project Objectives:
· To enhance understanding of the importance of early childhood literacy and how to create a life-long love of reading amongst low-income families
· To improve Hong Kong’s very low levels of family literacy by empowering parents to practice a regular reading habit with their children
· To provide easy access to the best children’s books (in English and Chinese) for families from the disadvantaged communities in Hong Kong
With the funding received from Operation Santa Claus, we installed 20 bookcases and conducted 40 First Teacher Trainings for 699 parents in the community. 1,398 quality children’s picture books were provided for free to families in need.
Key outcomes
· 85.8% parents indicated that they were confident to read with their children.
· 93% parents indicated that they would spend more time to read with their children.
· 96% would apply what they learn from the training to their daily lives.
· 53.4% of trained parents read with their children three times or more per week versus 37.5% before the training (about 16% increase).
· About 80% of trained parents spent more than 10 minutes to read with their children every time versus 62% before the training (18% increase).
Evaluation on the trainings conducted for parents
· Over 96% indicated that they understood the importance of read aloud and would spend more time to read with their children at home.
· 86% indicated that they want to receive advanced training on read aloud.
· Table 1: Comparison between the parents’ feedback on parent-child reading before and after training
Before / After / IncrementI know the read aloud skills / 33.2% / 76.3% / á43.1%
I am confidence to read with my children / 59.0% / 85.8% / á26.8%
I know how to overcome the challenges of reading aloud / 31.2% / 69.7% / á38.5%
I think it is easy to read aloud to my children at home / 46.4% / 77.4% / á31.0%
I know how to nurture my children to love reading / 34.2% / 73.4% / á39.2%
· Table 2: Feedback from parents after training
Agree/Strongly AgreeI will spend more time to read aloud with my children / 93.0%
I will apply what I learned from the workshop to my daily life / 96.0%
I will share the read aloud importance to my friends / 94.0%
Read aloud helps to improve the relationship with my children / 95.6%
I am happy while reading aloud with my children / 96.0%
· Table 3: Comparison between the parents’ feedback on picture books before and after training
Before / After / IncrementI know how to choose suitable books for my children / 43.1% / 74.3% / á31.2%
I can make good use of books to read with my children / 48.0% / 80.0% / á32.0%
I think picture books can improve children’s learning / 91.0% / 94.6% / á3.6%
I think picture books are good for children’s personality development / 92.0% / 96.3% / á4.3%
Evaluation on parents’ feedback on trainers
· Table 4: Feedback from parents on trainers
Agree/Strongly AgreeTrainer could present the message clearly. / 95.0%
Trainer encouraged positive interaction and the atmosphere was good. / 95.0%
Trainer could cover all the workshop materials within time. / 92.0%
Evaluation on the parent-child reading habits after the training
· 53.4% read with their children three times or above per week versus 37.5% before the training (about 16% increase).
· About 80% of trained parents spent more than 10 minutes to read with their children every time versus 62% before the training (18% increase).
· Table 5: Comparison between the parent-child reading frequency before and 6-month after the training
Parent-child reading frequency (times/week) / Before training / 6-month after training0 / 5.8% / 7.2%
1-2 / 52.6% / 39%
3-4 / 25.5% / 34.4% / á 8.9%
5 / 12% / 19% / á 7.0%
· Table 6: Comparison between the average time parents spent on reading with their children before and 6-month after the training
Time spent on reading (mins/session) / Before training / 6-month after trainingLess than 10 mins / 19.3% / 11.3% / â 8.0%
10 – 20 mins / 50.9% / 62.1% / á 11.2%
20 mins or above / 11.1% / 18.5% / á 7.4%
· Table 7. Comparison between the number of books processed at home before and 6-month after the training
Number of books at home / Before training / 6-month after training0 / 0.4% / 0.5% / á 0.1%
1-5 / 14.8% / 8.2% / â 6.6%
6-10 / 17.9% / 15.9% / â 2.0%
10-20 / 17.7% / 16.4% / â 1.3%
>20 / 37.0% / 58.0% / á 21.0%
· Table 8. Comparison of the number of (public and school) library visit per month before and 6-month after the training
Number of visit/month / Before training / 6-month after training0 / 11.2% / 6.2% / â 5.0%
1-2 / 49.3% / 40.0% / â 9.3%
3-4 / 19.2% / 35.9% / á 16.7%
>5 / 8.1% / 16.9% / á 8.8%
Benefits from training (from parents)
1. Understand a deeper meaning of parent-child relationship
2. Know to use more facial expression for storytelling
3. Make good use of time to read aloud with children
4. Understand more about the inner world of children
5. Nurture the good personality of children
6. Teach me how to help children to learn happily
7. Skill improvement, pace, tempo
8. Arrange 10-15 mins everyday to read with children
9. Understand how to learn and grow up with children
10. I will spend more time with children
11. Deepen children’s recognition to parents
12. Children love reading more
13. More creative
14. I will share more with my children
15. Help me to understand how to read a book
16. Reflect the meaning of reading
17. Change my view and way to read
Improvement suggestion by parents
1. Prefer more time on practice and less on sharing. More examples about books.
2. More workshops like these.
3. More parent-child reading activities
4. Let more people know about read aloud
5. Have more sharing
6. The workshop can be longer
7. Parents read aloud under trainers’ supervision
8. More time to learn from Pauline
9. Want to learn more practical tips
10. Questioning skills
11. The workshop should be delivered at earlier stage. The earlier the parents know about this, the more effective the read aloud
12. More sessions
13. Prefer workshop in the morning
14. Demonstrate more stories
15. Time management
16. To strengthen the read aloud skill
17. Longer Q & A session
18. More sharing on skills
19. Want to learn more about voice techniques, body language and other skills
20. Want to have advanced training