I Love When We Talk Now a Part of StrongStart BC Centres

Nov 29, 2010

I Love When We Talk In All StrongStart BC Centres

The early-literacy, early-language DVD, I Love When We Talk, was given to StrongStart BC Centres across the province as part of professional development workshops for StrongStart BC facilitators. 2010 Legacies Now provided the DVD's and partnered with British Columbia's Ministry of Education to provide the training.

StrongStart Workshops a Success

Workshops have just finished up and the Fiona Morrison, Director of Early Learning at 2010 Legacies Now, and StrongStart BC workshop leader, was pleased with the results. "There was a lot of idea sharing, networking and mentoring that took place at these workshops. The StrongStart facilitators really shone a light on how they engage, interact and educate families and children in their StrongStart BC Centres."

Over 400 I Love When We Talk DVD's Distributed

Fiona Morrison made sure that each StrongStart BC facilitator received a copy of the DVD, I Love When We Talk.

"I'm a big fan of the I Love When... series. I Love When You Read and I Love When We Count are in most StrongStart Centres so I was quite pleased to include I Love When We Talk as part of the resource package for facilitators." Twelve regional sessions were held throughout British Columbia and over 400 I Love When We Talk DVD's were distributed.

Fiona's Favourite Chapter

StrongStart BC facilitators discussed how the educational DVD can be used in their StrongStart BC centres. Fiona also used the DVD to spark discussion. Fiona says, "my favourite chapter of I Love When We Talk is called: The Importance of your Home Language. I co-developed the iPals (Immigrant Parents As Literacy Supporters) program and know of how important it is for parents to speak their home language to their young children.

"There is a mistaken assumption that parents should try to speak English as much as possible but that assumption has been proven wrong by research. The literacy skills a child learns when hearing and participating in their first language run deep. It also deepens their sense of self and their sense of their culture." The Importance of Your Home Language is a DVD extra feature in I Love When We Talk. Fiona shared the chapter as a tool to engage the facilitators in discussion and as a way to remind them to share this information and the DVD to their StrongStart BC families.

Conversation Between Children and Caregivers is a Cornerstone of Literacy

"Speech and language between children and their caregivers is a cornerstone of literacy. I appreciate that we have another tool that reinforces this for parents," Fiona concluded.