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Language is the foundation of learning

Children who have a good foundation in languages are like having the keys to a treasure trove of knowledge and are confident in learning different subjects. Launched in 2007, the "Paired-Reading Scheme" aimed to teach parents the paired-reading skills and encourage them to spend 20 minutes a day reading with their children, so that their children can discover the joy of reading, promote language development and inspire learning.
 

Parent-Child Paired-Reading Skills Practice

During the "Love Reading" stage of "Paired-Reading Scheme ", parents with their children undergo a 7-week systematic training programme to learn paired-reading skills under the guidance of a teacher, so that children can develop a sense of success from reading books and enjoy reading.
During the 'Read Often' stage, parents apply the Paired-Reading skills to keep on reading with their children and foster them to develop a reading habit.


Empirical research

We are honoured that Dr. Lam Shui Fong of the Department of Psychology of the University of Hong Kong conducted a three-year empirical research on the “Paired-Reading Scheme” in 2008, which showed that children who participated in the Scheme had improved their literacy skills, reading fluency and interest in reading, while parents' perception of their own abilities and parent-child relationship had increased significantly.
 
In 2018, Dr Lam was invited to conduct a follow-up study of the Scheme in primary schools. The results of the study found that YWCA graduates enjoyed school more than their counterparts, and liked Chinese and mathematics lessons more. The effect values for the upper grades were larger than those for the lower grades, meaning that the advantage of YWCA graduates did not fade with age, but rather became more pronounced as they grew older.