Transcript Improving Adult Literacy Instruction: Options for Practice and Research Committee on Learning Sciences: Foundations and Implications for Adolescent and Adult Literacy Division of Behavioral.

Improving Adult Literacy Instruction:
Options for Practice and Research
Committee on Learning Sciences: Foundations and
Implications for Adolescent and Adult Literacy
Division of Behavioral and Social Sciences and Education
National Research Council
We wish to thank the U.S. Department of Education
for sponsoring this study.
Committee
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ALAN M. LESGOLD (Chair), School of Education, University of Pittsburgh
KAREN COOK, Department of Sociology, Stanford University
AYDIN Y. DURGUNOGLU, Department of Psychology, University of Minnesota, Duluth
ARTHUR C. GRAESSER, Psychology Department, University of Memphis
STEVE GRAHAM, Special Education and Literacy, Peabody College of Vanderbilt University
NOEL GREGG, Regents’ Center for Learning Disorders and Psychology Department, University of
Georgia, Athens
JOYCE L. HARRIS, College of Communication, University of Texas at Austin
GLYNDA A. HULL, Graduate School of Education, University of California, Berkeley
MAUREEN W. LOVETT, Hospital for Sick Children and University of Toronto
DARYL F. MELLARD, School of Education, University of Kansas
ELIZABETH B. MOJE, School of Educational Studies, University of Michigan
KENNETH PUGH, Haskins Laboratories, New Haven
CHRIS SCHATSCHNEIDER, Department of Psychology, Florida State University
MARK S. SEIDENBERG, Department of Psychology, University of Wisconsin–Madison
ELIZABETH A.L. STINE-MORROW, Department of Education and Psychology, University of Illinois
The Costs of Low Literacy
Adults with low levels of literacy:
- have lower rates of participation in the labor force
- earn less than those with higher levels of literacy
- are less likely to read to their children
- have less ability to access, read, and use health
information
- Are costly to society because they earn too little
to pay much taxes and need more social supports
Americans’ Prose Literacy Levels*
14%
29%
44%
13%
Below Basic
Basic
Intermediate
Proficient
Level needed for
economic and self-care
competence
* Based on data from the National Assessment of Adult Literacy conducted in 2003.
Lifetime Tax Contributions by Education Level
Paying $10,000 to get an adult literacy
student to the level where he/she can
compete with high school graduates
over a 30 year career would yield enough
taxes to make that investment show a
12% annual yield!
Conclusions & Recommendations
Conclusions:
• Adult Learners and Learning Environments
• Principles of Effective Literacy Instruction
• English Language Learners
• Assessment
• Technology
• State of the Evidence on Adult Literacy
Instruction
Conclusions & Recommendations
Recommendations:
• Adult Literacy Education Infrastructure
• Professional Development and Technical
Assistance for Adult Literacy Instructors
• Supporting English Language Learners Persistence
in Literacy Studies
• Investment in a Coordinated and Systemic
Approach to Program Improvement, Evaluation,
and Research about Adult Literacy Learners
Conclusion 1:
Adult Learners and Learning Environments
Optimal reading and writing instruction will vary according
to goals for literacy development and learning, knowledge
and skill, interests, neurocognitive profiles, and cultural and
linguistic backgrounds.
The range of current instructional offerings may not match
well with the range that is needed.
Who Are Adult Literacy Learners?
• Recent immigrants who have little education in their native
languages
• Middle-aged and older U.S.-born high school graduates who can no
longer keep up with the reading, writing, and technology demands
of their jobs
• Adolescents and adults who dropped out of school
• Adults who had disabilities that were not fully accommodated in
school
• Highly educated immigrants who are literate in their native language
but need to learn to read and write in English
• Underprepared students in colleges
Conclusion 2:
Principles of Effective Literacy Instruction
• Focus on all reading components for which the student lacks
facility.
• Make the instruction motivating, since lots of practice is needed
and it is hard to get to classes or find time to practice.
• Focus on the automation and integration of component skills and
the transfer of skills to tasks valued by society and the learner.
• Do continual assessment to guide the selection of learning
opportunities for each learner.
Conclusion 3:
Principles of Effective Literacy Instruction
• Little research on the target population.
• Can infer a lot from research on high school and college students and
cognitive neuroscience research on effects of aging.
– Adult cognitive processes slow with age
– Adults acquire more knowledge that can make up in part for slower processing
• Plenty of good work to guide instructional improvement, but
translational research specifically on the target population is needed.
– Use what we can infer from research on other populations to make immediate
improvements
– Evaluate our improved efforts and focus research on testing and refining them
Conclusion 4:
Principles of Effective Literacy Instruction
Literacy development is a complex skill that requires thousands of
hours of practice to reach the levels needed for full opportunity in
modern life, yet many adults do not persist long enough in adult
education programs or developmental education courses.
• Need perhaps 3000 hours of practice
• Adult persistence in formal classes is in the range of 100 hours
• 3000 hours = 75 min per day of school from Kindergarten through
Grade 12!
Conclusion 5:
English Language Learners
• The component skills of reading and writing in English and the
principles of effective literacy instruction derived from
research with native English speakers are likely to apply to
English language learners.
• The adult ELL population is the largest group enrolled in adult
literacy classes and is very diverse.
• Different ELL students start with different skill components in
place.
Conclusion 6: Assessment
Improved adolescent and adult literacy programs require the
development of measures and comprehensive systems of assessment
that
• include measures of language and literacy skills related to a range
of literacy forms and tasks, domain knowledge, cognitive abilities,
and valued functional as well as psychological outcomes.
• include effective and useful measures for differentiated diagnosis,
placement, instruction, and accountability.
Conclusion 7: Technology
• Technologies can amplify and extend classroom instruction
and free instruction and practice from a particular time or
place.
– Given shrinking public funds and the needed for more efficient as well as
more effective adult literacy learning systems, such technology are likely
to be key to improving adult literacy.
Conclusion 8: Technology
• Moreover, adults need to be able to use new
communication technologies to perform the literacy
tasks that are required in the 21st century for education
and work, for maintaining health, and for civic
participation.
Conclusion 9:
Adult Literacy Instruction: State of the Evidence
The field lacks research and data required
to better define, prevent, and remediate
problems that adolescents and adults
enrolled in instruction outside compulsory
schooling are experiencing with developing
their literacy skills in the United States.
Recommendation 1
• Build on and expand the infrastructure of adult literacy
education
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Instructional approaches
Curricula and reading materials
Technologies
Assessments of learners and of the quality of instruction and
supports
Recommendation 2
Expand professional development and
technical assistance for instructors and
make it consistent with the best research on
reading, writing, learning, language, and
adult development.
Recommendation 3
Policymakers, providers of literacy programs, and
researchers should collaborate to find ways to
help adults persist in their literacy studies.
Recommendation 4
• Focus on sustained investment that permits
systematic translational research and evaluation of
best practices.
– instructional approaches and materials grounded in principles of
learning and instruction
– supports for persistence
– technologies for learning
– assessments of learners and their instructional environments
– Systematic, long-term data gathering and data mining
Recommendation 4 (continued)
Research and development efforts require:
• A coordination infrastructure that ensures continued focus on the
primary goal of producing a better educated workforce and citizenry.
• A strategy close to the five goals used in the Institute of Education
Sciences’ approach: exploration, innovation, efficacy testing, scaling up,
and assessment development.
• Attention to defining subgroups of learners that require specific
variations in instructional approaches to meet their needs.
• Practices to support a focused, long-term strategy (registries of
research findings; multidisciplinary centers to pursue synergistic
programs of work with an overarching research plan and regular
review by an advisory group of scientists for adherence to the plan).