One practical suggestion that arises in my research is to encourage families in their literacy practices. A challenge would be to set up a means to ensure that all children have ready access to basic literacy materials in their homes that would help support families in promoting learning. My research revealed that many of the children did not have pencils and crayons at their disposal or scrap paper on which to doodle and draw. Clearly, the schools could also play a greater role in making items such as calendars available to families that would not otherwise have these.

Gender and Class Issues

It was immediately evident in this study that not only are there class-based distinctions for women living in poverty, but also gender issues. While literacy is strongly associated with economic life chances, this relationship is not as straightforward when gender is taken into account. Poverty hits women in unequal proportion to men due to having fewer opportunities for employment and more family responsibilities. In many cases, the women are the sole caregivers for their children and have no support from a partner. That is, the caregiver role may also impact on their ability to go into the workforce. It might be surmised that living in poverty, in turn, affects their health, their education, their ambitions and their self–esteem. In many of the homes studied, it was clear that financial problems generated considerable household stress, which may have potentially lead to or contributed significantly to the breakdown of the family structure. The cases of both Natalie and Michelle highlight this point well.

Some women may be silenced by power politics (Giroux, 1988; Lewis 1993). Lewis (1993) uses the term phallocentrism instead of the familiar term patriarchy