Even Start Teaches a Parent To Reach a Child

By Deborah L. Cohen

Pekin, Ill.--Judy Bitner beams as she tells how her daughter, Ashley, at age 7, has already written her first book as part of a school project to encourage young authors. Her 3-year-old son, Bodie, meanwhile, is gaining an early appreciation of the written word from the stories his mother now reads to him each day.

But the 27-year-old single mother also has plenty to boast about in her own right. While Bodie attends an early-childhood program, Ms. Bitner pursues her own studies in an adjoining classroom in this central-Illinois community. Besides working on her own book--a project in which she takes obvious pride--she is honing her math, reading, and writing skills so she can earn a General Educational Development certificate. At the same time, she is mastering techniques to help stimulate her children's learning.

Ms. Bitner is a participant in Even Start, a federally funded program that combines adult-literacy and parenting training with early-childhood education in an effort to break the cycle of illiteracy that often passes...