This report describes and evaluates an adult and family literacy education program at the Tom Green County Library (Texas). The project's objectives were to: provide a full-time library staff member to establish, coordinate, and promote an information, referral, and follow-up support system for literacy students; offer two in-service sessions in…

This module, which may be used as the basis for a workshop or as a special topic unit in adult basic education or English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) courses, discusses how to access the formalized human service delivery systems in the United States, which often replace the networks of extended families and friends that immigrants relied on in…

The Mid-York Library System (Utica, New York) conducted a project that involved recruitment and public awareness. The project served a community of over 200,000 people, and targeted potential tutors and learners. The goal of the project was to produce and develop a sustained publicity project to promote the services of Literacy Volunteers of…

This document contains the 1998 Florida adult education program courses standards (curriculum frameworks and student performance standards) for major adult and literacy programs, as well as programs for workplace readiness skills, and special programs for the diverse population served in this area. Each program courses standard is composed of two…

This publication focuses on the stories of learners in workplace literacy programs in New Zealand. Nine adults give their perspectives on the changing nature of work, their attitude toward and experience of formal schooling, and the impetus that led them to participate in literacy learning opportunities established in their workplace. They talk…

This report describes the general features of "online learning communities," community organizations that have constructed learning delivery systems that effectively combine elements of the distance learning and traditional models of instruction. It discusses the online learning community framework and explains the four features of these…

The document describes the Changes Project, a participatory action research project conducted by adult learners at five adult literacy and education programs in Western Massachusetts. It is a 3-year project aimed at examining the impact of welfare reform, immigration reform, and the changing workplace on adult learners. The Changes Project is…

This workshop manual is intended for groups in the workplace. It leads the group step-by-step through problem-solving techniques based on both critical and creative thinking approaches to describe, analyze, plan, and act on a realistic shared understanding of the real problem and workable solutions. It begins with a problem-solving curriculum…

This publication offers summaries of presentations from a 2001 symposium on adult English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) research and practice. Presentations include the following: "Reading Research Synthesis" (Miriam Burt); "How Adults Learn to Read in English" (John Strucker); "Findings, Reactions to and Practitioner Implications of the 'What Works'…

An adult educator in Butler, Pennsylvania, noticed that, although students who took the General Aptitude Test Battery (GATB) seemed highly motivated to improve their basic skills in mathematics and spatial relations, only 2 of her 20 students who took the GATB made a concerted effort to develop their vocabulary. Thinking that those two students…

A study investigated the teaching of grammar in an advanced English as a Second Language (ESL) class in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. For a week, the instructor taught the students on the topic of comparatives, superlatives, and equatives. The instructor gave a written pretest, posttest, and a delayed posttest to the whole class of 15-25 immigrants and…

This report presents results from a computer-assisted search of the medical and public health literature published between 1990-99 that addressed literacy issues in health care and in health promotion education. Following a brief introduction on the subject of health and literacy, the literature search methods are described and the choice of…

This report proposes a plan of action to help the United States meet its literacy challenges. Section 1 is a call to action that emphasizes the challenge posed by the 1993 National Adult Literacy Survey that found more than 40 million adults--over a fifth of the adult population--have low literacy skills. Section 2 presents literacy as a national…

Shared writing is a technique for working with adult literacy learners that involves all members of the group, including the tutor, in regularly writing together, reading, and hearing each other's work, and occasionally preparing materials for publication to the outside community. In preparation for developing a professional development program…

This booklet, which was developed for adult literacy educators in Australia, summarizes selected research on health practices, communication, and literacy and outlines some issues that adult literacy teachers might consider in their work. The booklet begins with three anecdotes previewing the practical everyday challenges that literacy poses for…