We are excited to celebrate Family Literacy Day on January 27! This day has been celebrated across Canada since 1999. This year, the theme is Learning in the Great Outdoors and we are encouraging families to take their learning outside! January may be cold, but the sun shines bright, and there is so much we can learn outdoors.
Learning together outside has many benefits for everyone. When families are outside together we can feel better physically and emotionally. Feeling better can help children and adults focus and learn more. We also have so much to learn from the land itself, and they are lessons we can not learn inside. Learning outside also gives us the tools to bring activities inside and continue the learning.
In NWT communities many groups already take their family literacy programs outside. Here are some ideas from existing programs:
- Setting up snares or fishing nets and then processing the catch with families
- Sliding, skiing, snowshoeing or skating party with story time and hot chocolate
- Bird counts
- Snowman or snow building competitions
- Community-wide scavenger hunt
- Ice golf tournament
Here are several of our resources that can help with Family Literacy activities outside:
We encourage communities to put up StoryWalks© to celebrate Family Literacy Day. A StoryWalk© combines the pleasure of reading a book out loud with the benefits of being active and outside. You laminate the pages of a story book, hang the pages up outside and spend time moving between the pages to read the story. You can also add physical literacy activities along the way. NWTLC can provide guidance in creating a StoryWalk© and has the following StoryWalks© available to be borrowed:
- Kumak’s River by Michael Bania
- The Moose Who Almost Got Me by Jonas Neyelle
- Up in the Garden and Down in the Dirt by Kate Messner
- The Owl and the Lemming by Roselynn Akulukjuk
Community organizations can apply for an event grant of up to $500 to host an event between January 22 and 30, 2022. Your event must focus on families with children aged 0-6 participating along with their parents and caregivers. We can’t wait to see the creative ways that communities participate with the theme! Check out more information and apply here.
We hope everyone has a great time celebrating Learning in the Great Outdoors! Let us know what you are doing on Facebook, or by tagging us @nwtliteracycouncil on Instagram. You can find event resources and post your event on ABC Life Literacy Canada’s website.
- Katie Johnson, Family and Community Literacy Coordinator and Program Manager
