[AAACE-NLA] RE: AAACE-NLA Digest, Vol 17, Issue 28

Tue Oct 19 23:00:29 EDT 2004

I am very likely one of those 'unqualified educators' that is making you
uneasy Carl.  I am a Communications Major at Marylhurst University, doing my
internship at Job Corps by tutoring GED and ABE students.  While these
students have workbooks galore, they have no material for pleasure reading.
In fact, most of them do not see reading as a pleasure activity.  To help
excite them about reading, I am using magazines.  I can get old copies from
the local library and my students are beginning to see what they have been
missing.  Yes, it is a challenge to some, and we do a great deal of
'read-aloud'.  Some parts they read, some parts I read.  But we are having
fun, they are excited about reading, and the material is interesting to
them.

-----Original Message-----
From: aaace-nla-bounces at lists.literacytent.org
[mailto:aaace-nla-bounces at lists.literacytent.org]On Behalf Of
aaace-nla-request at lists.literacytent.org
Sent: Tuesday, October 19, 2004 6:07 AM
To: aaace-nla at lists.literacytent.org
Subject: AAACE-NLA Digest, Vol 17, Issue 28

Send AAACE-NLA mailing list submissions to
	aaace-nla at lists.literacytent.org

To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit
	http://lists.literacytent.org/mailman/listinfo/aaace-nla
or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to
	aaace-nla-request at lists.literacytent.org

You can reach the person managing the list at
	aaace-nla-owner at lists.literacytent.org

When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific
than "Re: Contents of AAACE-NLA digest..."

Today's Topics:

   1. RE:  Books for adult emerging readers (Guerriere, Carl)
   2. Re:  Books for adult emerging readers (John Comings)
   3. Re:  Books for adult emerging readers (George demetrion)
   4.  Family Literacy Op-ed (Tony Peyton)

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Message: 1
Date: Mon, 18 Oct 2004 16:36:35 -0400
From: "Guerriere, Carl" <carl.guerriere at po.state.ct.us>
Subject: RE: [AAACE-NLA] Books for adult emerging readers
To: "National Literacy Advocacy List sponsored by AAACE"
	<aaace-nla at lists.literacytent.org>
Message-ID:
	<78231E6E42E435448F12816A5FC411E969B6A5 at server01.crwdb.ds.exec.state.ct.us>

Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

I hope there is a qualified educator involved in this program somehow.
The fact that they are using Dr. Seuss books makes me very uneasy.  Well
intentioned people can do harm when they do not have the proper
background and/or materials.  Proliteracy's New Readers Press has age
and skill appropriate books.  800-448-8878

Carl Guerriere
Executive Director/Literacy Advocate
Greater Hartford Literacy Council
One Union Place (New Street Address!)
Hartford, CT  06103
(860) 522-7323 (522-READ)
www.greaterhartfordreads.org
Fax: (860) 722-2486
Reading. It takes you places.

-----Original Message-----
From: aaace-nla-bounces at lists.literacytent.org
[mailto:aaace-nla-bounces at lists.literacytent.org]On Behalf Of M C Smith
Sent: Monday, October 18, 2004 11:58 AM
To: aaace-nla at lists.literacytent.org
Subject: [AAACE-NLA] Books for adult emerging readers

Hi,

Sorry to clog up the list with this question, but am seeking information
that I know many of you out there can provide. A colleague at another
institution has recently become involved in an adult literacy project
for a major sports venue, of all things (no, not the "idiots"* on the
BoSox). The ESL instructors are looking for appropriate books for
emerging adult readers, most of whom are non-English speakers. They are
presently using Dr. Seuss books. Can anybody point me towards some
age-appropriate resources that I can pass along to my colleague?

[* - Disclaimer: For those of you not following the baseball playoffs,
please don't be offended by my use of "idiots"--that's how the Red Sox
players have taken to referring to themselves. In the interests of
self-disclosure, however, I am a Yankees fan: Why not embrace
excellence!]

Thanks for your help!

Cecil Smith

M Cecil Smith, Ph.D.
Professor of Educational Psychology
Northern Illinois University
DeKalb, IL 60115-2854
(815) 753-8448
(815) 753-8750 (FAX)
mcsmith at niu.edu
www.cedu.niu.edu/~smith/

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL:
http://lists.literacytent.org/pipermail/aaace-nla/attachments/20041018/4a551
f10/attachment-0001.htm

------------------------------

Message: 2
Date: Mon, 18 Oct 2004 16:40:17 -0400
From: John Comings <comingjo at gse.harvard.edu>
Subject: Re: [AAACE-NLA] Books for adult emerging readers
To: National Literacy Advocacy List sponsored by AAACE
	<aaace-nla at lists.literacytent.org>
Cc: M C Smith <mcsmith at niu.edu>
Message-ID: <31408062.1098117617 at 1234cumminjo>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed

NCSALL just put a list of resources for libraries on to its website, and it
has a section for learners. Look at:

 <http://ncsall.gse.harvard.edu/NCSALL_Library_Literacy_Resources.pdf>

On the left-hand side of page 11 is a list of publishers of books for new
readers.

The Red Sox of Boston will prevail against the evil empire of the Yankees
of New York, if not this year then, for sure, next year.

--On Monday, October 18, 2004 10:57 AM -0500 M C Smith <mcsmith at niu.edu>
wrote:

> Hi,
>
> Sorry to clog up the list with this question, but am seeking information
> that I know many of you out there can provide. A colleague at another
> institution has recently become involved in an adult literacy project for
> a major sports venue, of all things (no, not the "idiots"* on the BoSox).
> The ESL instructors are looking for appropriate books for emerging adult
> readers, most of whom are non-English speakers. They are presently using
> Dr. Seuss books. Can anybody point me towards some age-appropriate
> resources that I can pass along to my colleague?
>
> [* - Disclaimer: For those of you not following the baseball playoffs,
> please don't be offended by my use of "idiots"--that's how the Red Sox
> players have taken to referring to themselves. In the interests of
> self-disclosure, however, I am a Yankees fan: Why not embrace excellence!]
>
> Thanks for your help!
>
> Cecil Smith
>
>
> M Cecil Smith, Ph.D.
> Professor of Educational Psychology
> Northern Illinois University
> DeKalb, IL 60115-2854
> (815) 753-8448
> (815) 753-8750 (FAX)
> mcsmith at niu.edu
> www.cedu.niu.edu/~smith/

John Comings
National Center for the Study of Adult Learning and Literacy
Harvard Graduate School of Education
7 Appian Way
Cambridge MA 02138
(617) 496-0516, voice
(617) 495-4811, fax
(617) 335-9839, mobile
john_comings at harvard.edu
http://ncsall.gse.harvard.edu

------------------------------

Message: 3
Date: Mon, 18 Oct 2004 17:50:31 -0400
From: "George demetrion" <gdemetrion at msn.com>
Subject: Re: [AAACE-NLA] Books for adult emerging readers
To: "National Literacy Advocacy List sponsored by AAACE"
	<aaace-nla at lists.literacytent.org>
Message-ID: <BAY4-DAV31pkNzPZrIk0001de0c at hotmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"

----- Original Message -----
From: John Comings
Sent: Monday, October 18, 2004 5:04 PM
To: National Literacy Advocacy List sponsored by AAACE
Cc: M C Smith
Subject: Re: [AAACE-NLA] Books for adult emerging readers

The Red Sox of Boston will prevail against the evil empire of the Yankees
of New York, if not this year then, for sure, next year.

To the ever hopeful Red Sox fans, I have one question to ask, "Whose your
daddy?"  And yes, John, that is a rhetorical question
George Demetrion
Die hard Yankee fan since age 4
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL:
http://lists.literacytent.org/pipermail/aaace-nla/attachments/20041018/bcab6
9c8/attachment-0001.htm

------------------------------

Message: 4
Date: Tue, 19 Oct 2004 07:57:57 -0400
From: "Tony Peyton" <tpeyton at famlit.org>
Subject: [AAACE-NLA] Family Literacy Op-ed
To: "'National Literacy Advocacy List sponsored by AAACE'"
	<aaace-nla at lists.literacytent.org>
Message-ID: <002a01c4b5d2$e0b03360$54881a0a at famlit.net>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

The following is an op-ed piece that was in the Sunday, Oct. 17 edition of
The Indianapolis Star.

 <http://www.indystar.com/articles/3/186939-4753-021.html>
http://www.indystar.com/articles/3/186939-4753-021.html

Dan Carpenter (op-ed Columnist)

"Tense times on front lines of family values"

Brady Ray may not know a lot about $250 million congressional
appropriations, but he is learning his numbers.

As his classmates and their moms read stories, draw pictures and arrange
plastic groceries on miniature tables, Brady grips a man-sized pencil in his
4-year-old fingers and follows his mother's lead across the lined off-white
sheet of paper.

"Now make a straight line," Shane Ray says. "No, all the way down. There.
Now make a circle. The other way, like this. All right!"

With the completion of his 6, Brady rares back and allows himself a grin, as
he's done on most stops in his successful journey from 0 to 9. His mother
would accept a pat on the back as well.

She is 25. She dropped out of school after ninth grade. She has never been
able to find decent work. She and Brady and his 6-year-old sister, Paytton,
live with her parents. She hopes to be a certified nurse's assistant some
day. She must first pass the graduate equivalency exam, and that's why she's
here. That, and her children.

Shane Ray and eight other young mothers spend their weekdays and
occasionally their evenings at School 39 on the Near-Southside, one of 21
Indiana locations for a unique federally funded program for low-income
families called Even Start.

Their sons and daughters are there also -- down the hall in their own
classrooms part of the day and at work and play with their moms for much of
it. Field trips are taken to apple orchards, the Indianapolis Zoo and other
places the kids have rarely if ever seen. Party nights are held with book
giveaways. Outside organizations get involved with things like job searches
and health tests. School staff visit everyone's home from time to time to
see how the learning is progressing.

It is part of a national movement known as family literacy, and it works.
GEDs are being earned by parents who've failed in previous tries. Children
learn, academically and socially. It's impossible to put a precise yardstick
on a program that serves the poorest of the poor and includes infants to
8-year-olds depending on the site. But the Indiana Department of Public
Instruction offers compelling statistics:

Last year in Indiana, 631 families with 658 adults and 877 children took
part. Of the 286 preschool children, upwards of 85 percent increased at
least one level in academic and social skills. Ninety-six percent of the
school-age children progressed, and 86 percent of the adults advanced at
least one level.

"It's incredible," says Berneta Sherck, coordinator of Even Start for the
DPI. "I've worked in a lot of different programs, and it's amazing what this
one can do for families -- not just educating the parents, but getting the
kids ready for school, which is what we're all supposed to be about. And the
community is required to be involved. You talk about 'It takes a village?'
This is the program."

Not to everybody. Citing unsatisfactory performance numbers that supporters
say are obsolete, the Bush administration wants to kill Even Start.
Congress, in recess for the election, is divided. The House has approved a
$20 million cut, to just under $230 million; while the pending Senate
appropriations bill has no money at all. After three straight years of
fending off budget attacks, this is Even Start's deepest limbo.

"It's an ongoing dilemma," says Linda Hogan, the program director for
Indianapolis Public Schools, which has four Even Start sites. "Yet we know
we've been very successful. We've seen the difference it's made in kids'
lives."

It's helped Shane Ray get ready for kindergarten, his mother says; and it's
helped her help him.

Nearby on a typical rapid morning at School 39, it is helping Donna White
teach 2-year-old Cheyenne, with her bounty of plastic goodies, the hard
lesson of sharing.

It is giving Danielle Robbins the delight of watching 3-year-old Demetrius
carry "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?" across a busy classroom and
place it carefully on a bookshelf.

How to read, how to count, how to get along, how to be a parent. The
technique is called PACT (Parent and Child Together). For people with little
money and limited experience, it aims to make education imaginable by making
everyday life more manageable. Never mind how early or how late.

"There's nothing out there if you don't have education," says Rachelle
Robinson, a 33-year-old mother of three who comes to school after her night
job as a housekeeper. "You could be 40 or 50 and be doing the same thing.
They'll say 'She's a hard worker' and that'll be it. I'm excited about this.
I really am."

Those who must think about next year have more complicated emotions.

"I'm passionate about this," says Sherck. "And I'm very concerned about
what's going to happen."

Carpenter is a Star op-ed columnist. Contact him at (317) 444-6172 or via
e-mail at dan.carpenter at indystar.com.

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL:
http://lists.literacytent.org/pipermail/aaace-nla/attachments/20041019/685c3
416/attachment.htm

------------------------------

_______________________________________________
AAACE-NLA mailing list
AAACE-NLA at lists.literacytent.org
http://lists.literacytent.org/mailman/listinfo/aaace-nla

End of AAACE-NLA Digest, Vol 17, Issue 28
*****************************************