This book, which is intended as a practical guide to functional literacy at the grassroots level, addresses a range of issues encountered by literacy workers when mobilizing, planning, teaching, supervising, and evaluating adult literacy programs. The following topics are discussed: adult literacy, literacy teachers, and literacy work; the many faces of literacy; the motivations of functional literacy; curriculum development and program development; existing information about the teaching of reading, writing, numeracy, and functional skills; functional literacy materials for teachers and learners; understanding learners and their communities; human relations and the dynamics of teaching functional literacy groups; the work of a literacy teacher; the literacy supervisor in action; and literacy projects, programs, and campaigns as a total literacy system. Topics are covered primarily from the perspective of the field worker; however, the perspectives of literacy supervisors, literacy organizers, and literacy specialists are also presented both directly and indirectly at different points throughout the book. The bibliography lists 17 references. (MN)