Skip to content
  1. Home
  2. Community

Local events planned for family literacy week

Events will include “giggle, sing and swim, and “snack with a snowman”
Jake Sherman
10262363_web1_copy_IMG_4061
Liam Maltais receives a free book at last year’s Dinner with a Dino event. (Photo submitted)

Community literacy coordinator Tracy Spannier believes learning can happen anytime.

She also says life learning and literacy are intricately connected, and that that was the idea that started family literacy week in 1999, which is a national literacy awareness campaign created by ABC Life Literacy Canada.

But here in Revelstoke, Spannier has organized what began as a day and has become a full week since 2001, when she started by sharing oral language and learning, songs, stories and rhymes.

This year, the Revelstoke Early Childhood Development Committee and Columbia Basin Alliance for Literacy will be co-hosting two events, and promoting a social media campaign that is focused on celebrating the kind of learning that happens around the kitchen table.

The theme is “what’s on my plate,” and Decoda Literacy Solutions is holding a provincial wide photo contest.

To enter the contest you need to use the hashtag: #FLW2018

Only ten more sleeps until Family Literacy Week! #FLW2018

A post shared by Decoda Literacy Solutions (@decodaliteracy) on

“We’re really looking at parents as children’s first and most important teachers,” said Spannier. “We know there are huge impacts for families, and this is our moment to celebrate them.”

For that reason much of the learning this year will be about nutrition and health.

There will be two local events throughout the week. The first, “giggle, sing and swim,” will take place at the Revelstoke Aquatic Centre on Jan. 24. at 10 a.m. Each child will require an adult participant be in attendance and the idea is to bring families into the pool and learn outside of the classroom while celebrating the family dynamic. The second is “snack with a snowman” to be held on Jan. 27. between 9 a.m. and 12 p.m. at the Revelstoke Early Years Centre.

“This kind of learning really happens everyday, and recently we’ve learned so much about about the brain, the psychology of learning, and the importance of language in early childhood development,” said Spannier.

For more information contact the Revelstoke Early Years and Childhood Development Centre.