Family Literacy Events

Family Literacy Fun Festivals:

For the Whole School Community

An in-person event for children in grades TK-6, with their caregivers.

Host a Words in the Wild Family Literacy Fun Festival to build confidence, curiosity, and community around literacy. At a literacy festival children and their families explore a variety of hands-on games and activities to practice reading and writing, with joy.

Words in the Wild helps communities host Family Literacy Festivals (aka family literacy nights) in several ways:

1. Purchase our detailed ready-to-print DIY Toolkit to plan and run your own Family Literacy Fun Festival event (content description below)

2. Request our free mini kit of printable stations

3. Hire us to lead your community’s event (subject to availability) with the Toolkit PLUS option.

For more information click the link for a free consultation call below. We love chatting - don’t be shy!

Family Literacy Workshops:

For Caregivers

Workshops for families/caregivers, with or without their children present. In-person or remote. Offered as a standalone workshop, or as a series!

Beyond Books: Everyday Family Literacy. Explore multilingual storytelling, audiobooks, nature journaling, and non-book based ways that families can foster literacy development. Our strengths-based approach builds on the rich literacy practices and language resources of all families, including those historically marginalized from school. Discover ways that you already build reading and writing skills at home, and learn new ones!

Shared Reading with More Joy, Less Stress. Parents are told to “read with your child  every day,” but this isn’t always as easy as it sounds. We’ll explore ways to build vocabulary, comprehension, and other skills through shared reading. Participants may bring their own book in any language. We will also provide books for practice. 

Stressless Summer Reading Menu. Create a ‘menu’ with realistic plans to help your child(ren) keep up with learning over the summer. We’ll share ideas that are enjoyable, relationship building, and minimize stress. We love partnering with teachers and librarians for this session.

Details: Events are typically 90-minutes, in-person, in English, Spanish, or bilingual, and ideal as a series. Travel fees apply outside of the SF Bay Area. Please contact us for assistance with identifying funding, putting together a package with professional development, or requesting sliding scale.

Toolkit Description

The Words in the Wild​ downloadable, ready-to-print Family Literacy Fun Festival Toolkit provides schools with a comprehensive, low-lift guide to hosting an interactive family literacy night​ and tons of resources.

Event Planning Tools

• Customizable Planning Sheet: A central digital hub to manage your event’s timeline, budget, volunteers, and vendors.

• Step-by-Step Timeline: A suggested planning schedule, from securing permits to picking up food.

• Budget Template: Templates to track prospective and actual expenses, including outside vendors and supplies.

• Volunteer Management: Sample sign-up forms with roles such as greeters, activity facilitators, and photographers.

Interactive Activity Stations: Ready-to-Print Resources

The toolkit includes detailed facilitation instructions plus printable materials, signage, and display directions for three types of literacy stations: 

• Word Games: High-energy games like Word Toss, Base Race, and Fishy Fishy that build morphological and phonemic awareness, spelling, and phonics knowledge.

• Take-Home Activities: Creative stations such as Nature Bookmarks and Flower Frisbees that give families inspiration to continue literacy practice at home.

• Imagination Stations: Collaborative spaces for expressive writing and engaging with oral language, including a Word Wall, Story Builder and classic Read Alouds.

Promotion & Engagement

• Promo Plan: Tips and templates for promoting the event through fliers, newsletters, and social media.

• Event Bingo Card: A customizable tool to encourage families to explore every station and fully participate in the night. (Kids LOVE this, especially if you offer a raffle ticket for completion)

The Family Literacy Fun Festival Toolkit PLUS

Our team can show up to host the lead the event for you (limited availability). This option includes everything in the Toolkit, PLUS:

• Up to two 30-minute planning calls and one debrief call with Words in the Wild staff

• A Words in the Wild Facilitator for 3 consecutive hours on-site, including set-up (30 min), training of volunteers/teachers (30 min), event (90 min), and takedown with site support (30 min) 

• All materials for up to 8 Words in the Wild games and activities (assumes maximum 150 participants)

  
  

  School/organization provides:

  • ​Volunteers or staff to support activities (min. 5) and set-up/take-down (min 1 who is familiar with the space)

  • A single point of contact for planning

  • An administrator must be on site

  • A lead/point person must be on-site (may be the same as administrator)

  • Permits, custodial, and other facilities

  • Food (if relevant)

  • Location

  • Advertising/marketing/Promotion to community (we provide templates, schedule and ideas!)

Not sure where to start? Not ready to commit? Or just short on budget to fund your big dreams?!

Start with our FREE DIY Mini Kit. This sampler packet has 5 easy to assemble downloadable games to try!