Module 3 – Curriculum
Basic Literacy Skills
Reading
Reading silently to oneself and understanding what is read so that the text serves its intended purpose requires a set of very complex skills. According to the Adult Reading Components (ARCS) study, these skills fall into two groups: print skills and meaning skills. Many adult learners may have already acquired these skills through their life experiences or they may be unaware that they are missing specific reading skills. What they do know is that reading is difficult and requires a significant effort. They want to learn to read, or to read better, to improve their daily lives.
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“And also the adult classes taught me how to read a map. I learned how to find myself around here in town with the little yellow map book when I had to go out and look for apartments.” |
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“Because there’s a lot of interesting things that you misses when you can’t read. Like newspapers, you can’t sit down and read it, you miss everything. You try to sit down with other peoples and get in on the conversation, and you don’t know what they’re talking about, you didn’t read the newspaper.” |
Take a moment to consider how you might access resources for instruction and support of adult literacy learners who need or wish to build basic reading skills.
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On your worksheet, record your initial thoughts about curriculum for teaching basic reading skills. |
Some assessments may measure only one reading component skill, such as silent comprehension, or give an overall reading score that does not provide sufficient information on individual reading skills. For these reasons, diagnostic testing is important to provide a complete assessment of all reading component skills. Multiple reading assessments may be needed. Once instructors have identified specific reading skills, they can begin determining specific reading instruction. There is a wide array of commercial curricula and materials for teaching reading. Be sure you are familiar with what is available to you in your literacy program.
Below is a real-life adult education scenario. While you are reading, consider the learner’s strengths and needs. What are the next steps the instructor might take to determine an appropriate curriculum for this learner?
Real-Life Scenario – Paula’s Writing Difficulties:
Paula has trouble with writing. She wants to pass the GED, but her TABE scores indicate that while she reads at about a 6th grade level, she has very low-level language skills. In practice she has trouble writing even a single sentence: “I can’t spell. The words are there in my head, but I can’t come up with the letters to put on the paper.” Her instructor, Yvonne, had Paula write her answers to comprehension questions from a story she read and discussed them with her afterwards. They were both surprised to discover that Paula’s writing problem was really a reading problem since it was clear that Paula did not know some of the words in the story. She struggles with word analysis skills and does not sound out unfamiliar words when she reads. She uses sight words, context cues, and trial and error with initial letter sounds to read popular novels. As spelling is really “encoding” - the opposite of word analysis (decoding) - Yvonne and Paula decide to work on developing Paula’s phonics skills and spelling skills together.
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On your worksheet, record your thoughts about Paula’s reading strengths and needs. |
Click the + sign in the box to the right to see ideas from other Adult Education Instructors. | [?] |
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It’s important that students feel success. Some students might be able to read a sentence with very little prompting (fluent). If I anticipate that others are going to have a problem, I might review some of the challenging words before I have them read a passage (vocabulary practice). I try to build success into everything I ask them to do.
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My students seem to read well as far as being able to pronounce words; yet, they have difficulty discussing the meaning of the words or summing up what a paragraph means. They spend so much time on decoding, that they aren’t looking for meaning. I have them write or tell me a brief story about their lives and then read it back to me. Then they summarize it for the class. This way I know vocabulary and background knowledge aren’t at issue.
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I’ve had good experiences with systematic phonics curricula like Wilson, Laubach, or Language! These are all designed for adults and focus on building phonics skills to fluency at the learner’s own pace. They take a lot of one on one time though, and can be costly. [Note: these are teacher comments, not government endorsement of these materials.]
In reviewing these ideas, did you find any similar to your own? Did any of them strike you as particularly interesting? Did they provide any new insights for your instruction of adult literacy learners?
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On your worksheet, make note of any tips, insights, or new ideas gained from the instructors’ suggestions. |
In Summary:
- Teaching basic reading skills can be challenging for adult literacy instructors because of its complexity.
- Of great assistance in determining an appropriate curriculum are diagnostic reading assessments that identify which specific reading skills need to be addressed. Some free reading skills assessments can be found on the ARCS (Adult Reading Components Study) site.
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On your worksheet, record any final notes or thoughts, specific ideas you want to remember, plans for further study, etc. |
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