It’s Family Literacy Week and that means celebrating literacy in all its forms.

When we think of literacy, typically reading and writing come to mind and verbal skills are an afterthought, if considered at all.

Education faculty member Gloria Ramirez wants to change that. Passionate about the verbal side of literacy, she has dedicated portions of her research to it. Her interest stems from her childhood in Colombia.

“My parents were both farmers, so their literacy in that traditional sense was very low, but they were great storytellers. They were also very adept at incorporating storytelling into the family routines,” she said recently during the Talk to the Experts portion of the Paul Graham Show on Kamloops’ Radio NL.

Her father’s compelling stories, the riddles that stumped for days and the series of tricky tongue twisters all proved to be a fertile learning environment and helped influence her career direction and her research interests.

The entirety of Graham’s interview with Ramirez on child literacy follows, broken into three clips:

Clip 1 — 11: 44
Broadening the definition of literacy; growing up on the farm; is technology negatively affecting literacy?:

Clip 2 — 10:18
At the University of Toronto; early literacy skills lead to better lives; creating flexibility in reading:

Clip 3 — 13:45
Carving out reading time with children; developing probing conversations; recommended titles:

During their conversation, Graham and Ramirez weave together a variety of topics, including balancing technology, ways parents can carve out time to practice literacy, literacy levels and earning potential, why children may struggle with reading, developing conversation skills through probing and open-ended questions, being aware of different reading styles and some of her current research projects.

And, of course, what would a conversation about children’s literacy be without a mention of books? Here’s her short list of picture books that will spark conversations about life lessons:

• I Wanna Iguana teaches negotiation skills through a series of letters between a mother and son.
• The True Story of the Three Little Pigs demonstrates that life often has more than one viewpoint.
• Who Would Win? Lion vs. Tiger looks at decision-making by weighing facts and probabilities.
• The Cow that Laid an Egg looks at being happy with our talents and not feeling insecure because of the abilities of others.

Ramirez says, “I invite all adults to look at these picture books because we think they are for children, but I think we can reap a lot of benefits from them because they are so much fun.”