Literacy – Spanning North America :: Cornwall ON :: Gettysburg PA :: Tucson AZ :: Cape Girardeau MO

Literacy: Spanning North America     

Tri Co Literacy

It’s All About Literacy For Volunteer

Glengarry News (Press Reader): 2.27.2019 by Steven Warburton

For the past two years, Apple Hill area resident Alison Tucker has been helping local residents improve their literacy skills. It doesn’t matter if they are recent immigrants or students looking to upgrade their skills, Mrs. Tucker will work with anyone who wants to enhance their English skills.

The England-born Mrs. Tucker, who worked as a nurse for 40 years and also taught at St. Lawrence College, does her volunteer work through the TriCounty Literacy Council, whom, she says, offered her the perfect retirement project.

“I was looking to do something that I love and I wanted it to be volunteer work,” she says. “I didn’t want to be tied to a schedule.”

The Cornwall-based TriCounty Literacy Council specializes in addressing adult literacy needs in the Stormont, Dundas and Glengarry. It does this by helping upgrade literacy skills, prepare students for GEDs, conduct computer training and provide occupational training for entry-level positions.

Despite all of this, Mrs. Tucker says there isn’t a whole lot of awareness about the program in rural areas.  READ MORE >>

@LincolnIU12

Reading Changed His Life Forever

Gettysburg Times: 2.28.2019 by T.W. Burger

In a March 2002, interview with Times reporter Dick Watson, James Gourley said learning how to read changed his life forever.

“I never would have believed the opportunities that opened up as a result of knowing how to read,” he said.

“Now, I read everything I can get my hands on,” he said.

After a couple of years of work with the Adams County Literacy Council, he achieved his goal.

He was 40 years old at the time.

After that, he began speaking to students around the county on behalf of the literacy council. In 1996, he was awarded the Laubach Literacy’s national award of excellence and joined its national speaker’s bureau.

James R. Gourley Jr., of Orrtanna, died on Jan. 29, 2019, in the York Hospital. He was 71.

In the same Times interview, James revealed that his life before literacy had been one of shame and fear his lack of literacy would be found out. He fooled friends, neighbors, children and employers into thinking he was literate. At home, he would pretend to be too tired to play monopoly or help with homework.

Twice, he quit jobs because he was promoted to positions where he would have to deal with paperwork.

Instead, he went into construction work.  READ MORE >>

@LitConnectsAZ

Literacy Connects Aims To Improve Local Economy, Lives

Arizona Daily Star: 3.01.2019 by Ann Brown

Literacy Connects percolated from a 2007 regional town hall, which identified increasing literacy as the best way to ensure a prosperous economy and improved quality of life for everyone.

Town hall participants were shocked by the appalling fact that only 23 percent of Americans read proficiently, says Betty Stauffer, executive director of Literacy Connects.

In Arizona, an estimated 530,000 adults read at or below a fifth-grade equivalent, according to the National Assessment of Adult Literacy.

Literacy has a direct link to economic development. Employers want a well-trained, qualified workforce. It also has an impact on everyday lives of those who must read and comprehend things like contracts, voter guides and notes from children’s teachers.

Literacy Connects emerged in July 2011 after many meetings, facilitated discussions and strategic planning sessions about the best way to offer quality literacy services. Five organizations merged: Literacy Volunteers of Tucson, Reading Seed, Reach Out and Read Southern Arizona, Literacy for Life Coalition and Stories That Soar.  READ MORE >>

Cape Girardeau AEL

Literacy Center Branch Opens In Marble Hill

SE Missourian: 3.02.2019 by Dawn Bollinger

The Cape Adult and Literacy Center opened a new branch at the Bollinger County Library in January.

Getting an education matters; however, sometimes people do not have the opportunity to graduate from high school along with their peers.

The Adult Education and Literacy (AEL) program located in Cape Girardeau works to help rectify that situation. By offering HSET (High School Equivalency Test) classes to prepare students to take the HSET exam, formerly know as the GED, the center makes it possible for adults to advance in their current jobs or to begin new careers through advanced educational skills, or even to continue to college.

DESE (Department of Elementary and Secondary Education) put into place the guidelines for all Adult Education and Literacy programs in the state.

Adult Education and Literacy consists of three levels: Adult Basic Education, Adult Secondary Education, and English Language Acquisition classes. The program emphasizes basic skills such as reading, writing, math, and English language acquisition, if necessary.  READ MORE >>

Obstacles and Creative Solutions of Learners via Literacy Quebec

@LiteracyQuebec 

The Obstacles and Creative Solutions of Learners

Literacy Quebec Podcast Episode 3: 3.29.2019

Every two weeks our hosts Chris Shee and Jaimie Cudmore from Literacy Quebec explore topics around community building, lifelong learning and literacy for English-speakers in Quebec.

Just in time for Adult Learner's Week! In this episode, we spoke to learners, lunchers, and a researcher about some of the obstacles and creative solutions to gaining different types of literacy skills. We had the chance to present the podcast at Reclaim Literacy's weekly Lunch and Learn.

We discussed digital literacy and access to podcasts with Betty, Ruth and Sylvia. We also had the opportunity to chat and get advice from Jonathan and Lorenzo from CDC Vimont and the Learning Exchange in Laval. Paul Lalonde, a researcher from the Social Research and Demonstration Corporation, speaks with Jaimie in Ottawa about the findings of Frontier College's National report, "Literacy and Essential Skills as a Poverty Reduction Strategy."  LISTEN 39:04

Some Health Literacy Basics :: Infographic via HCP

@healthcompart

Infographic: Some Health Literacy Basics

HCP: 7.27.2018 by Anne Marie Liebel

As health professionals, you care about health literacy.

Health literacy is a large field. The research on health literacy covers a massive territory. So it’s easy to get lost in the weeds.

A few weeks back, I wrote a short article on this. Here’s an infographic that’s even speedier.

Here, I’m offering some loose groupings or distinctions in health literacy–both research and practice–that have emerged in my reading of the research, and talking with providers over the years. These distinctions may be helpful if you’re trying to wrap your head around some of the complexities in the field.  READ MORE >>

National Literacy & Library Events :: April 2019

National Literacy & Library Events :: April 2019

Literacy & Library Events & Conferences

Events-National & International Events

Events-International: Language Magazine

School Library Month

National Poetry Month

Financial Literacy Month

Mar. 30      Money Smart Week

Apr. 01      International Edible Book Festival Books2Eat

Apr. 02      International Children's Book Day

Apr. 02      Wisconsin Health Literacy Summit Madison WI

Apr. 04      American Occupational Therapy Assoc New Orleans LA

Apr. 05      American Educational Research Assoc Toronto CA

Apr. 05      Orton Gillingham Conference White Plains NY

Apr. 06      Color of Children's Literature Conf CUNY NY

Apr. 07      National Library Week "Libraries Transform"

Apr. 07      National Volunteer Week

Apr. 09      National Library Workers Day

Apr. 10      National Bookmobile Day

Apr. 12      Drop Everything & Read Day

Apr. 12      Urban Librarians Conference Brooklyn NY

Apr. 13      Nonprofit Technology Conference Portland OR

Apr. 13      Telling Your Library Story for Community Impact, Advocacy and Action

Apr. 15      Dyslexia Virtual Conference Dyslexia Training Institute

Apr. 17      Haiku Poetry Day

Apr. 17      DPLAfest 2019 Chicago IL

Apr. 20      Young People’s Poetry Day

Apr. 21      Cowboy Poetry Week

Apr. 23      World Book and Copyright Day

Apr. 23      World Book Night

Apr. 27      Indie Bookstore Day

Apr. 27      Literacy Education Advocacy Day

Apr. 27      Tell a Story Day

Apr. 28      Great Poetry Reading Day

Apr. 29      Children's Book Week "A great nation is a reading nation"

Apr. 29      Head Start Conference San Antonio TX

Apr. 30      Dia: El día de los niños/El día de los libros @ Public & School Libraries

Apr. 30      BOOST Conference Palm Springs CA

Apr. 30      Young Child Expo NY NY

State Library Associations :: Conferences

African American Book Events

Book Fairs by State Library of Congress

Children’s Book Council Kid Lit Events

College Children’s & Young Adult Literature Conferences Festivals

Everfest Book Festival Calendar

ILA :: Literacy Calendar Worldwide

Storytelling Events

US Book Festivals

Literacy – Spanning the US :: Gainesville FL :: Philadelphia PA :: Connersville IN

Literacy: Spanning the U.S.     

@alachualibrary

Alachua County Library Wins Grant To Teach English To Those Who Don’t Speak It

WUFT: 2.22.2019 by Jessica Curbelo

English literacy is a family affair for Bruno Pedreira.

Pedreira, with his family in tow, arrived in July for a year of agronomy research with the University of Florida. While he settled into work, his daughters settled into J.J. Finley Elementary School’s ESOL (English for Speakers of Other Languages) program. His wife, Sylvia Moraes, found her own tutor at the library: the Tower Road branch of the Alachua County Library District, to be exact.

A tip from another member of Gainesville’s Brazilian community inspired Pedreira and Moraes to go. Pedreira said it was at a social mixer where Moraes met her coach. Within weeks of arriving in the United States, Moraes was a part of the library’s English Language Learners (ELLs) program.

The program this month began using a $10,000 grant from the American Library Association that would help it expand and offer tutoring services to more people like Moraes. The Alachua County Library District was one of 16 recipients. Patricia Carr, the project director for the ELLs program, said the aid was much needed.

“We have a lot of people who come in every day,” Carr said. “Some days, we get two or three applicants a day.”  READ MORE >>

@FreeLibrary

Learning The Language Of Survival: English Lessons Through Civic Engagement At The Free Library

Philly.com: 2.27.2019 by TyLisa C. Johnson and Jesenia De Moya Correa

Carmen Cancel often left her doctors’ visits feeling unsatisfied and misunderstood, despite having a medical interpreter.

Cancel, a native Spanish speaker, just wanted to talk directly with the physicians who care for her spine, without the middleman.

“I want to have a conversation with them, not have someone speak for me,” Cancel, 56, said in Spanish. Then, “I could tell them what I am feeling.”

About a year ago, Cancel began adult English classes at a local nonprofit. But it wasn’t until she joined the Free Library’s English for Civic Engagement class a month ago that she grew confident enough to speak English.

“This course is giving me the confidence I needed to be able to talk,” said Cancel, of Fairhill. “This is what I was missing.”

The first of its kind, the eight-week class is offered only through the Lillian Marrero Branch in North Philadelphia. It teaches adult students the phrases, vocabulary, and grammar needed to navigate daily experiences through a curriculum tailored to individual needs and robust discussions, mostly in English, about community issues.

It breaks with the more traditional English as a Second Language (ESL) classes offered at branches across the city, and instead embraces a curriculum shaped by its students.  READ MORE >>

Fayette Co

Literacy

Mardi Gras Party Aims To Help With Adult Literacy

News Examiner: 2.28.2019 by Leana Choate

Fayette County Community Voices is looking to start a program to tutor adults in Fayette County who need help with reading. The group is having a Mardi Gras party Tuesday to help raise funds for it.

The Fayette County Literacy and Education Capital, a group affiliated with Community Voices, is organizing the project.

“We’re trying to get something set up to help adults in our community who need help with reading and writing,” Lea Ann Robinson, Community Voices president, said.

Community interest has waned for adult tutoring, Robinson said.

“We talked to surrounding counties and they haven’t had their adult tutoring programs in years. The Morrisson-Reeves Library in Richmond used to have a program but they stopped because these programs were not able to find tutors,” Robinson said.

Amy Engle, the adult basic education coordinator for the Whitewater Adult Education Program, said that 18 percent of adults 18 and older in the community do not have a high school diploma or a High School Equivalency degree.  READ MORE >>

Bringing Literacy To Laundromats With Libraries Without Borders

@BSF_Intl

Bringing Literacy To Laundromats With Libraries Without Borders

Herald Tribune: 1.27.2019 by Kim Doleatto

What do libraries and laundromats have in common?

Like butter and potatoes, not much, but mashed together they’re brilliant.

Libraries Without Borders’ Wash and Learn Initiative does the mashing by bringing colorful spaces with story times, toys and books to laundromats, turning lengthy wait times into opportunities for early learning.

In the time between washing, drying and folding, the Laundry and Literacy spaces invite parents to sing, talk and read with their children, all activities proven to benefit brain growth, vocabulary, comprehension and even behavior.

While the importance of parent engagement is documented, the delivery of such early education programming sometimes misses the mark.

“We see the importance of meeting people where they’re at,” said Adam Echelman, executive director of Libraries Without Borders, a nonprofit focused on breaking barriers between underserved communities and access to information.

“Why create a whole program in a space people don’t recognize and may be inaccessible, when you already have a laundromat where families are waiting,” Echelman said.

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That’s why there’s a Wash and Learn Initiative in Minnesota delivered in Hmong, a Southeast Asian language commonly spoken in that community.

Active in about 30 laundromats in about 10 states across the country, the program is as hyper-local as the laundromat itself.

It relies on local public libraries and librarians to learn about whom they’re not serving and which community needs more support.  READ MORE >>

'Reading Bedtime Stories Helped Me Survive Prison' via BBC

@Storybookdads

'Reading Bedtime Stories Helped Me Survive Prison'

BBC: 3.23.2019 by Dougal Shaw

Lewis Hardy was struggling in prison, feeling isolated from his young family and increasingly "cold". Then he was shown a way of doing something that many parents take for granted - reading to his children - and everything began to change.

Lewis Hardy had just been released from prison and was getting a taxi home to see his two sons for the first time in nine months, when he got the call he dreaded.

"What are you up to?" a familiar voice enquired.

"I'm just in a taxi to see my boys."

"Don't worry about that," said his old friend. "See them tomorrow. Come to the pub with us lot."

But Lewis knew exactly what to say.

"I ain't ever going to the pub with 'you lot' ever again. My kids are more important."

Prisoners get a lot of time to think, Lewis says, and he'd figured out what was the right decision for him.

═════════►

So while going to prison is "never lucky", he says, he considers himself fortunate to have been signed up for a programme called Storybook Dads.

This gives prisoners with young children a chance to spend time in a studio recording bedtime stories, which are then sent to their families at home on CD or DVD.

"As soon as you walked in through the doors, it was just complete relaxation, you felt safe," remembers Lewis.  READ MORE >>

Literacy – Spanning the US :: Bangor ME :: Knoxville TN :: St Cloud MN :: Seneca Co NY

Literacy: Spanning the U.S.     

@LitVolBangor

One of Literacy Volunteers of Bangor First Tutors Reflects On Experiences

WABI TV: 2.20.2019 by Courtney Cortright

This year, the Literacy Volunteers of Bangor is celebrating 50 years as an organization. They've come a long way since they began. We spoke with Paula Adelman. She's one of the group's first tutors.

Paul Adelman said, "I saw a video of a mother going to give her child, a baby, some medication, and she couldn't read what the prescription was on the bottle."

It was a moment that triggered Paula Adelman's motherly instinct.

"I had three little kids, and I thought, oh my Lord, this woman could kill her child while she's trying to help her child," added Adelman.

Paula answered the call for help in 1969, the year Literacy Volunteers of Bangor was founded. The organization is dedicated to helping adults who may not be comfortable with their reading and writing skills.

"The co-founders went around to everyone and said, you be the secretary, you'll be the treasurer, and they came to me and said, you're going to be the first chairperson," explained Adelman.

Although hesitant at first, it was a challenge Adelman was ready to take on.

Mary Marin Lyon, Executive Director, said, "Paula was part of that very first group of tutors."

Adelman said, "I got my first student. He wanted to get his driver's license and improving his life and I got him up to the third grade, 4th grade, and he took his driver's test and oral test and after that, he drove off into the sunset because that was his goal."  READ MORE >>

@supportliteracy

Friends of Literacy: 10 Percent Of Adults In Knoxville Are Functionally Illiterate

WBIR: 2.20.2019 by Emily DeVoe

Sharon Kocuba has been a teacher for more than 20 years, but she never tires of seeing the impact an education can have on someone, no matter their age.

“You may see an older student out in the neighborhood later who’s done beyond what they did in my class. It’s a success story,” Kocuba said.

Angelita Ortiz, a mother of two, is one of Kocuba’s students at Friends of Literacy, a nonprofit that helps adults improve their reading, writing and math skills.

“She does her homework every night. She asks questions and is very honest about what she knows and what she doesn’t know. She’s the ideal student,” Kocuba said.

Ortiz grew up in New York where she dropped out of school at an early age.

“I made bad choices when I was younger,” Ortiz said. “I was a troubled teenager and dropped out at an early age. I’m glad I came here.”

In 2018, 174 adults took classes at Friends of Literacy. 80 percent started at or below an 8th grade level. 60 percent started below 6th grade.  READ MORE >>

@GRiverLibrary

Library Receives Grant To Fund Literacy Project

SC Times: 2.20.2019

Great River Regional Library received a grant worth more than $89,000 to fund a year-long literacy project.

The project, "Breaking Down Barriers to Family Literacy," will provide opportunities for people to improve digital literacy and for non-native speakers to practice English in "informal, stress-free settings," according to a press release.

@US_IMLS

The Institute of Museum and Library Services provided funds through the Grants to States Program administered through the Department of Education.

All Great River Regional Library staff will receive cultural fluency training as part of the program. The grant also helped the library hire two part-time bilingual cultural navigators to assist Somali-speaking patrons.

The project is a partnership between Great River Regional Library, Adult Basic Education, Career Solutions and Partners for Student Success.  READ MORE >>

Literacy Seneca

Fourteen Students Cited By Literacy Volunteers of Seneca County

Finger Lake Times: 2.21.2019 by David L Shaw

Fourteen students were recognized for making progress by Literacy Volunteers of Seneca County at the organization’s recent annual dinner.

One of them was a 30-year-old named Stanley, who has worked with tutor Chuck DeParde for four years to learn to read and write.

“For a long time, I was really messed up,” Stanley said. “Now my goal is to learn to read and write and do math.”

DeParde said Stanley “started from absolutely nothing.”

“He is now in Book 4. He has made great progress,” he added.

Executive Director Kathy Sigrist said one of Literacy Volunteer’s challenges is removing the shame felt by older people who have limited reading and writing skills. She said it’s never too late to improve one’s skills in these areas.  READ MORE >>