Erin is a high school graduate with a Medical Secretary Diploma from Career College. She works as a secretary and a telephone research surveyor. She has completed on the job training and said she is “always system learning because we’re always updating.” She has taken a course for Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy and has completed courses for dealing with conflict in different situations. She watches approximately 15 hours of television a week, mostly sitcoms. Erin uses the internet about 12 hours a week to email and chat.

Erin expects her daughter to complete a university degree. She models writing by completing bills and taxes. Erin does computer work at home and her daughter sees her reading off the computer. Erin and her daughter watch television together. Erin is in a choir and practices at home but she tries “not to sing around my daughter because she doesn’t like it.”

Erin’s daughter “doesn’t ask for help with homework. But if she does I will help, especially with computer research.” Erin no longer reads to her daughter and said, “It wasn’t a nightly thing when she was a child either.” Erin’s daughter likes teen magazines and Erin is “always buying her magazines. There are not a lot of books for her at home, just more magazines.” Erin’s daughter “only brings books home from the library if she has to, like for Language Arts class.” She has a library card but does not use it. Erin’s daughter “used to like books” and went to a summer reading program at the library when she was in Grade 2 or 3. Erin doesn’t remember when her daughter “stopped liking books.”

Erin’s daughter watches two hours of sitcoms a day. She also uses the internet for two hours a day where she “reads an ongoing story and talks to friends on the internet.” She uses the internet primarily to email and chat.

Erin and her daughter used to go to movies once or twice a month. They also “used to go to the museum, TELUS World of Science and zoo. But we haven’t gone anywhere since last year; she’s not into that anymore.”