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TULITA/FORT NORMAN - Terry Kunkel said his five-year-old daughter is becoming more involved in learning at home.

“Because we’re involved in doing it, she’s become more of a student at home,” he said. “It’s a great thing.”

Dawn Widow works on an interactive learning activities book she made as part of the Family Tutoring Program offered in Tulita. The nine session program helped parents learn strategies to improve their kids reading, writing and vocabulary. - photo courtesy of Ashley Brennan

Kunkel, along with other parents and guardians in Tulita, recently completed the Family Tutoring Program, giving them the skills and strategies they need to help their kids learn.

A nine-session program funded by NWT Literacy Council, the program is designed to improve the reading and writing skills of school-aged children. Using a family approach to learning the tutoring sessions helped parents to strengthen their English literacy skills and learn ways to facilitate learning strategies at home.

“It was great to be given the opportunity to help teach our children how to fit into the school and how to promote ways for our children to make learning fun,” he said.

Parents learned a variety of teaching techniques such as how to effectively read out loud and methods to enhance their children's retention and comprehension skills, said Ashley Brennan, Chief Albert Wright School teacher and program facilitator.

“They learned to help their kids make connections between the book and their lives, not just read the book out loud. We showed them how to use pictures to teach and to use the stories their kids tell to help them write them down and learn spelling and vocabulary,” she said.

Brennan said the program is well structured to bridge the gap between parenting and teaching while providing peer support.

“It goes against the assumption that parents necessarily know what to do with their kids at home with learning,” she said. “A lot of parents want to help their kids, it’s not a question of want or desire they just struggle with how to help their kids. They know they’re supposed to read to them but they don’t necessarily know how to. We just gave them the tools.”

Kunkel said he enjoyed sharing similar experiences with other parents who are working toward creating educational opportunities for their children at home.

“We’re all about the same,” he said. “We all deal with the same problems with our children where you might think you’re unique in certain ways. We got the chance to discuss how we solve problems.”

Parents also had to the chance to relive their younger years. Parents got to hone their arts and crafts skills, making puppets for interactive learning and storybooks for their kids to work with, something Kunkel enjoyed.

Brennan, along with Sister Celeste Goulet, facilitated session. Between 20 and 25 parents attended some of the session and Brennan said seven parents completed all nine sessions.

“It was really exciting,” she said. "Programs like this aren’t always well attended and we had about seven families who came for the entire nine sessions. In a community of 450 people it was really encouraging to see that kind of commitment and desire to help their kids.”