Parent Resource Hub

Birth to Pre-K

Information for Parents

ABC Literacy
This resource from PBS Kids provides tips for helping to develop your child’s literacy skills, for ages 2-8.

Blendable Sounds
As children are learning the sounds associated with letters, it’s important that the pronunciation of the sounds are blendable. This video provides an example of how to pronounce the sound associated with each letter of the alphabet.

Build Your Child’s Vocabulary
This article from the Hanen Center provides some excellent guidance on how to support your child’s development of oral language and vocabulary.

Center for Early Literacy Learning
The Center for Early Literacy Learning has developed some great materials to help parents in promoting their child’s early literacy development.

Cultivating Readers: Making Reading Active and Fun
This guide from the National Center for Family Literacy is designed to help parents support their young readers.

Early Childhood Resources
The University of Washington College of Education has shared a collection of resources to support child and family well-being during Coronavirus-related school/program closures and telework arrangements.

Helping Your Child Become a Reader
This resource from the Florida Department of Education contains language-building activities that you can do with your child to help the skills needed to become a reader.

Homeschool Hideout
This blog lists 150+ Educational Shows on Netflix, arranged by topic.

How Does Your Child Hear and Talk?
This guide from the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association will help you determine if your child is meeting typical developmental milestones.

How to Raise a Reader
This guide from the NY Times provides simple, sensible tips on how to ensure that your child gets a good start in reading.

Put Reading First
This parent guide summarizes the National Reading Panel’s findings about how to help children learn to read. It lists important things parents should see teachers doing at school, and provides suggestions for how to help a child at home.

Reading is Fundamental
Reading is Fundamental has a range of parent resources, including activities, puzzles, and videos to support children’s literacy development.

Reading Rockets
Reading Rockets has a wealth of information to help parents address their child’s needs in all areas of literacy.

Reading Tips for Parents
This brief guide from the US Department of Education has simple reading and writing tips for and parent of young children.

Reinforcing Language Skills for Our Youngest Learners
The National Association for the Education of Young Children has helpful tips for developing your young child’s oral language skills.

Shining Stars: Toddlers Get Ready to Read
Shining Stars: Preschoolers Get Ready to Read
These guides from the National Institute for Literacy will take you through some of the things you can do as you read aloud with your child.

Story Mentors
Story Mentors is an online intervention library for beginning and struggling readers. The resources include beginning readers, mentor guides, and at-home resources.

Support Writing at Home
This helpful guide from the National Association for the Education of Young Children contains tips for developing your young child’s early writing skills.

Talking is Teaching
Talking is Teaching has a wealth of resources to help parents of young children promote strong language skills.

Activities for Children
Baldwin Library of Historical Children Literature
The Baldwin Library of Historical Children’s Literature at the University of Florida provides digital access to thousands of classic titles. Explore some of your child’s favorites.

Bananagrams
Bananagrams is a fun word-building game for the whole family, and now they have a free app, so you can play electronically.

Core Knowledge Language Arts
The Core Knowledge Foundation provides free, downloadable materials in various subject areas, including language arts. Activities are provided for Pre-K to Grade 5.

Daily Newsletter from PBS Kids
PBS Kids’ new weekday newsletter offers activities and tips you can use to help kids learn and play at home.

The Indianapolis Public Library
The Indianapolis Public Library has a collection of hundreds of free videos of books being read aloud.

International Digital Children’s Library
The International Children’s Digital Library provides books (in several languages) that students and parents can read online

Just Books Read Aloud
Just Books Read Aloud is just what it sounds like–videos of books read aloud. The books are read by volunteers, so the quality varies, but there are many to choose from.

Khan Academy Kids
Khan Academy Kids offers a free app with fun, educational activities for kids ages 2-7.

Molly of Denali
Molly of Denali from PBS Kids includes videos, games, printable activities, and informational text.

Nessy
Nessy has activities for kids and guidance for parents of students with dyslexia.

Reading Bear
Reading Bear provides access to free phonics and vocabulary games and activities

Reading with Ms. Colleen
UFLI’s very own Colleen Pollett has developed a YouTube channel where she posts read-alouds of her favorite books.

Scholastic Learn at Home
Scholastic offers a wide range of free, learn-at-home activities for kids of all ages.

Sesame Street
Did you know that Sesame Street has online games and activities to support your child’s language and literacy development?

Sheppard Software
Sheppard Software has hundreds of free, online, learning games in many subject areas for kids (and adults!). Many of these games are great for knowledge building, which helps kids get better at comprehending what they read.

Spanish Children’s Stories
The Spanish Experiment offers well-known children’s stories translated into Spanish and spoken by a native Spanish speaker. Great for kids… and adults too!

Starfall
Starfall has a variety of games and activities for reading as well other subjects.

Storyline Online
Storyline Online is THE place to go to hear celebrities read children’s books aloud!

Storytime from Space
Hear astronauts read stories from the International Space Station!

Unite for Literacy
Unite for Literacy has a great collection of free online books for younger kids.

Virtual Field Trips
Over 30 Virtual Field Trips with Links

Vooks
Vooks offers a year of free access to their collection of animated storybooks.

Organizations

The Anita Zucker Center for Excellence in Early Childhood Studies at UF
AZCEECS is an interdisciplinary center at the University of Florida, dedicated to advancing knowledge, policy and practices in early childhood studies. The center’s website hosts resources for families including articles and videos, and a series called the A to Z’s of Early Childhood (http://ceecs.education.ufl.edu/atoz/), which highlights quick tips on how to strengthen children’s development.

Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Parent Portal
The CDC provides lots of resources for parents of children of all ages, including articles, videos, and a searchable data base on hot topics.

Center for Early Literacy Learning
The Center for Early Literacy Learning has developed some great materials to help parents in promoting their child’s early literacy development.

Center for Parent Information and Recourses
CPIR’s mission is to provide families with a central location to find information about Parent Centers throughout the country and their offerings. Parent Centers are organizations that work with families of infants, toddlers, children, and youth with disabilities, helping them participate effectively in their child’s education and development.

Center on the Social and Emotional Foundations for Early Learning
CSEFEL, based at Valderbilt University, focuses on initiatives that promote the social emotional development and school readiness of young children, birth – 5. The Family Tools section of the website provides free Parent Training Modules, teaching families how to support their child’s social and emotional development.

Colorín Colorado
This organization provides language and literacy resources geared towards educators and families of English language learners. The website hosts free research-based information, activities, and advice for families, teachers, and communities.

Children’s Literacy Initiative
CLI is a non-profit organization working with early childhood educators and families to improve literacy instruction. These resources include an Education @ Home section.

Every Child a Reader
This organization creates and supports programs designed to promote the joy of reading an essential part of daily life. They provide free resources to parents and educators in support of this mission.

Florida Diagnostic & Learning Resource System (FDLRS)
FDLRS provides diagnostic, instructional, and technology support services to district exceptional education programs and families of students with disabilities. Service centers include 19 centers that directly serve school districts in the areas of Child Find, Parent Services, Human Resource Development (HRD), and Technology. In addition, the FDLRS Network also includes 6 Multi-disciplinary Centers who focus on in-depth evaluations and several statewide projects offering specialized services.

The Florida Center for Reading Research (FCRR) 
FCRR conducts and disseminates research on reading instruction, intervention, and assessment in Florida and nationally. They also provide literacy-related technical assistance to Florida’s schools and the State Department of Education.

Hanon Centre 
The Hanon Centre is non-profit organization whose purpose is to support educators and families to develop the language and literacy skills of all children. Resources and information that might be useful to parents include articles about child development and language and emergent literacy, a Book Nook, and workshops both online and face to face across several countries.

Head Start Center for Inclusion
The Center, which provides resources to assist Head Start programs in inclusion initiatives, also includes resources for families of young children with disabilities participating in Head Start and Early Head Start.

National Association for the Education of Young Children
NAEYC is a national professional organization for early childhood educators, with special resources for families including articles that can be browsed by topic, a list of books to support learning at home, and a plethora of activities to engage and grow the minds of young children.

National Center for Family Literacy
This website provides families with strategies, programming, and resources to support multigenerational literacy. They offerings include a broad range of activities, from virtual Parent Cafes to music lessons, professional development, and helpful publications.

The National Centers on Improving Literacy (NCIL)
NCIL is a partnership among literacy experts, university researchers, and technical assistance providers, with funding from the United States Department of Education. Their mission is to increase access to, and use of, evidence-based approaches to screen, identify, and teach students with literacy-related disabilities, including dyslexia.

Zero to Three
Zero to Three is an organization dedicated to supporting the growth and development of very young children. Information and resources that will. Be of interest to families, a Parent’s Favorites page with a collection of their highest trending family resources, with topics such as Play, Early Learning, Challenging Behavior, Sleep, and more.