Dear Fli,

I know that one of the big questions we need to answer as an organization is what do we mean when we say we are a family literacy program. Are there any guidelines or definitions that we could work from? I guess I don’t know what family literacy is “supposed” to look like, so I don’t know where to begin with thinking about what RIFLI family literacy “should” be. Can you give me something to work with here?

- Searching for Meaning

Dear Searching for Meaning,

That’s a great question and an important discussion for us all to have. Below  is the federal government’s definition of family literacy:

“services that are of sufficient intensity in terms of hours, and of sufficient duration, to make sustainable changes in a family and that integrate all of the following activities:

(A)       Interactive literacy activities between parents and their children.

(B)     Training for parents regarding how to be the primary teacher for their children and full partners in the education of their children

(C)      Parent literacy training that leads to economic self-sufficiency

(D)     An age-appropriate education to prepare children for success in school and life experiences.”

This probably does not describe our program to a “T”. One term that has been discussed that might fit us better is “Community Literacy.” I hope you will join in on the conversation as RIFLI tries to decide what “Family Literacy” means to us!

- The Fli

 

Dear Fli,

I wasn’t at the retreat, but I heard that there was a lot of information on goals and objectives. I don’t really use these in my planning right now. How do I write these and how should I be using them in the classroom?

Sincerely,

Got No Goals

Dear Got No Goals,

You might be surprised that there are many, many goals and objectives in your classroom right now -- you may just not have focused on them -- yet!  Every one of your students who walks into your classroom has goals for being there.  You have goals for teaching what you teach and for using the materials that you use.  It's now time to make those goals transparent and purposeful.

Research shows that students who set clear goals, no matter what their level of language skills, are considerably more likely to continue to participate in ESL classes than students without clear goals.  It is worth the effort to spend a considerable amount of time helping students articulate their goals, developing a shared class goal ("shared priority") and being transparent in how classroom activities relate to that goal.

Not only do you need clear goals, you also need well-thought out objectives to reach your  goals.  Try using the following formula for writing an objective:

The learner will be able to + verb (use the list from the last issue of the FLI paper !)+ condition + how well or when it must be done

Here's a class' shared priority taken from a teacher's March monthly report: Learners want to speak so that doctors can understand.  Now let's apply the formula for a well-written objective to help those learners work toward that goal and to help direct our teaching.

Objective #1:  Learners will be able to explain a personal/family ailment using at least 4 medical terms within 5 minutes (average time of an appointment!).

You may develop several objectives to meet one goal.  Once the objectives are determined, teaching becomes much more meaningful and easy. Both you and your students now have a plan to work towards your goals!

- The Fli