All of the organizations that participated in the project recruited mostly in Francophone schools and child care centres (63.8%)and, to a small degree, through newspaper advertisements.
Centres situated in regions where Francophones make up less than 10%of the population generally had difficulty recruiting. The director of one centre advertised the programs at private companies in the region, which enabled them to reach families that otherwise may not have heard about the program. All of the reports reveal some concern about the issue of recruitment.
The programs generally attract nearly five times as many women as men. In the first cohort, 10 out of 62 adults were fathers. In the second and third cohorts, 31 fathers out of 192 adults took part in the programs. Of these fathers, 24 participated in the model Lire et écrire à la maison, which targets parents of school-age children. This suggests that fathers are more interested in their child's learning once the child starts school, an observation also made by Ortiz et al. (1999).12 The fourth and fifth cohorts included 23 fathers out of 128 adults.
Language characteristics
The research showed that 35%-45% of the families that participed in the programs lived in exogamous households, and that 55%-65% of participating families reported that they speak French at home.
Age
Parents between 31 and 40 years of age with children four years of age and under (33%)or five to six years of age (over 50%)made up the largest group reached by the research. Note that parents of children five to six years of age took part in the model Lire et écrire à la maison.
Parents' reasons for participating
The research shows that parents participate in family literacy programs in French mainly for their child's sake. They cite the following reasons:
These reasons are a constant factor of all of the family literacy programs covered in the research.
12 See section 6.4.3.