Adult Ed's role in School Readiness

Adult Schools in California serve as a critical strand in school readiness activities in California.
Many communities benefit from strong Parent-Child Participation (or Mommy and Me) classes, in which parents learn from a credentialed expert in early childhood education how to be successful as their child's first and most important teacher. Parents learn about child development, family communications, and discipline, and learn how to provide school readiness activites in their homes. Children have their first school experience in a loving and comfortable environment, learning behaviors such as sharing, exploring, and sitting quietly with other children to hear a story read to them.
Family Literacy programs, often funded through CBET, have emerged as a groundbreaking new opportunity to encourage parents and their children to learn together while parents study English and their children are in an enriched child care environment. The successes of this Prop. 227 program would be maximized if funding were available to provide credentialed ECE teachers to work with these new immigrant, low income children while their parents are learning English.
Additionally, many adult schools offer high school diploma programs to serve pregnant and parenting teens, and provide special parenting training and experiences (Like Parent-Child classes for Teen Parents) for these teens so they can learn the important skills of raising "wired" children.