Journals and Logs: What Are They?
 Since
the beginning of the Shared Reading Project in Hawai'i and at the
Kendall Demonstration Elementary School for the Deaf at Gallaudet,
tutors and families have been asked to keep written logs of their
experiences, questions, and thoughts about Shared Reading.
Tutors wrote about their experiences in helping their assigned
families learn to share books with their young deaf children. The
project coordinator read the tutors' logs, provided them with feedback
and coached them on how to work more effectively with their families.
Families wrote about their experiences as recipients of the training
and as the readers of books to their children. They were encouraged
to record any questions they wanted to ask the tutor during the
next visit. These logs helped the tutor understand the concerns
and needs of their particular families and to deliver the help their
families needed.
The logs give a glimpse into the interaction processes that are
such an important part of Shared Reading. The parents and tutors
have given permission for excerpts of these logs to be used here
for training and illustration purposes. The names of each of the
families, family members, and tutors have been changed to protect
the privacy of these Shared Reading families.
For evaluation of the Shared Reading Project beginning in 1997-1998,
the "Family Reading Record"
form replaced the open-ended family of previous years. The Reading
Record was developed to provide families with a calendar to record
when they read to their deaf child between tutor visits and with
a more structured format for recording their questions and experiences.
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