LINCS Reading and Writing
Community of Practice
Newsletter
December 2015

To download this publication in Word, go to the Documents Tab.

Welcome New Members!

From November up to this December Publication date: Holly Carey, Nora Devlin, Joan Wissert, Darius, Frasure, Vincent Pellegrino, and Mardie McIlmoyl, Leigh Ann Verbeck, and Sahar Saeed. Welcome one and all!

From your Profile: Darius is an instructor whose profile can be found on  Facebook,  https://www.facebook.com/dariusajaifrasure and LinkedIn, https://www.linkedin.com/in/dariusfrasure . His smiling face appears on both. Hope to hear more from you, Darius, and from all new and older members of this CoP!

Please, if you haven’t done so, take a few minutes to complete your own profile in LINCS so that we can get to know you better. Let me know if you do! I would like to summarize your information in our next newsletter!

Also, please introduce yourself in the “Getting to Know You” or in the “Introduce Yourself” forum, listed toward the top of your Discussions page.

Hot Topics: LINCS Reading and Writing CoP

Following is a list of topics that we have covered in our discussions of late. Those topics remain open, so feel free to comment on any of them by clicking in the Discussions Tab, and then on the topic of your choice.

Would you like to open a new topic? We need your participation and interaction as we build our little learning community to serve your needs and interests! Post a problem you are facing. Post a case study. Post an activity that you recommend for engaging adult learners in your practice. Post a question, a resource, an idea, a reference. Whatever your preference to interaction and dialogue, post! This community is here to serve you. Let’s get to know each other and share our experience and knowledge. Deal?

During this holiday season, please consider gifting your Reading and Writing Community of Practice (CoP) with a post on any topic relating to what might help you or others become better resources for our adult learners. Let's start the new year, 2016, with your voice! As you give, others will gift you in return. It's a win-win proposition!

In November-December, from our last publication date to this one, we covered the following topics and resources:

1. Political Literacy                                        
2. How HSE Programs are Responding to the Difficulty...   
3. Influenza, 1918: Summarizing informational text 
4. Graduate Courses in Adult Literacy               
5. 2015 NCTN Workshops: Who would you like to hear...            
6. Passing the Essay Section of the GED             
7. Improving Reading Fluency among Adults        
8. Your professional interests or needs that LINCS...        
9. EVENT Idea 1- Study Circles!                         
10. How to Use Comic Strip Making Websites to Enhance... 
11. GED Practice Site                                        
12. Online Course: Differentiated Instruction and... 
13. The New USA Learns                                    
14. What's Good for the Geese or Goose
15. New Online Google Apps for Education Tools to...        
16. Thanksgiving                                               
17. Lessons for Adult Ed from CTE               
18. Reading and Writing CoP Sept Newsletter!
19. The Literacy List: Work Readiness and Work-...   
20. Using videos to build vocabulary and as writing...        
21. Blended Learning in Adult Education by Rosen   
22. Funding Issues
23. What does "turkey" mean?

There are active discussions taking place in this and the Diversity and Learning  community around the topics of nonformal instructional approaches and providers, and the suggestion that we include political literacy among the topics we use to generate learning among our adults. Join us there and contribute your ideas. 

What were your favorite topics? What topics would you like to add? Open a new discussion in the Discussion tab and start your own thread. We need your voice, your opinions, your presence!

To access and join any previous discussions listed in our newsletters, click on the Discussions tab; scroll to the bottom and click on the page numbers listed. Previous discussions show up as you click back.

LINCS News

Reading and Writing LINCS Newsletter – Do you want to continue to have access to this newsletter? If so, click on the Poll Tab in our group home, and respond to the poll  question.

As you access the resources listed below, also browse the right-hand column for related resources, including courses in some cases. Rich!

• What Is Evidence-Based Reading Instruction and How Do You Know It When You See It? (Kit Bell and Stephen Dolainski, 2012) - This policy brief defines and describes evidence-based reading instruction, demonstrates what evidence-based reading instruction looks like in the classroom, and discusses how evidence-based reading instruction has been implemented with the Los Angeles Unified School District. - http://lincs.ed.gov/professional-development/resource-collections/profile-226
• KET: Reading Instructional Strategies:  “This collection of video segments produced by KET provides resources for teaching reading in the adult education classroom. In this collection, you will find individual lessons tailored to teaching specific strategies such as questioning, repeated reading, and summarizing. You will also find suggestions for choosing texts that are appropriate and interesting for adult learners. Each resource contains a video clip accompanied by a printable background essay and suggested discussion questions.” - https://lincs.ed.gov/professional-development/resource-collections/profile-866

LINCS provides you with an ever-expanding and searchable Resource Collection, along with free self-paced courses that will add to your professional toolkit. Take a few minutes during the holidays to explore this treasure chest!

The LINCS Learner Center connects adult learners to free online resources to reach life goals in areas such as improving reading, math, and science skills, learning English, building job and job search skills, becoming a U.S. citizen, and finding an adult education, child, family, and digital literacy program.

There is a current discussion taking place in this and the Reading and Writing community around political literacy among the topics we use to generate learning among our adults. Join us there and contribute your ideas. 

Featured Resources/Articles

If you have a resource recommendation for this newsletter, please send me the information, and I’ll post it in our next issue, with credit given. (leecy@reconnectioncompany.com) Alternatively, and even more highly recommended, post a discussion in our community and start a new dialogue!

Open-Service MOOC

Paul Rogers and David Rosen introduced a developing discussion on the role of nonformal, non-profit agencies in delivering instruction to adult learners in some of our LINCS CoPs. Along that same line, you are invited to contribute to innovative and promising virtual service-learning projects with Designers for Learning.

Designers for Learning is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit that coordinates service-learning opportunities for those who seek to gain experience creating instruction to support important social causes. Their next service-learning experience will focus on the instructional design of open educational resources (OER) for adult basic education as part of a free open service MOOC on the Canvas.net online platform beginning on February 22, 2106. 

Open-service MOOC participants will be immersed into a real-world authentic instructional design challenge centered on the design of instruction for a topic that aligns with an anchor standard in the College and Career Readiness Standards. During the 12-week course, participants will progress through planned exercises, individual reflection, and group discussion to design a solution to the instructional need. 

Participants will develop a prototype that will be the subject of a round of formative evaluation. As the final assignment, each service learner will submit a complete unit of instruction that must conform to the project’s style guide, and incorporate all necessary content presentation, learner practice, and assessment materials. Upon successful completion, participants will receive an instructional design service badge, a Certificate of Recognition, and an invitation to include the instructional materials in the Adult Learning Zone group on OER Commons. To receive updates about Designers for Learning projects, or to simply explore and share information about this organization, its work, and selection process, go to http://designersforlearning.org/contact.

Additional Resources

• Knowmia, by Tech Smith:  Use video presentations and interactive assignments to impact students both in and out of the classroom. It’s simple and free. The site allows you to create and post plans and to use its vast instructional resources. Click on “Explore Lessons.” I searched under “Writing,” “Reading,” “Literacy,” and “Diversity,” and found several appealing titles, which could engage adults. Of course, for “Diversity,” I found videos on bio-diversity. Those made good points as well that could easily be written about. There is a Pro version that is designed for a broader audience and is particularly suitable for advanced video lessons/training, presentations, technical tutorials and creative storytelling. -  http://www.knowmia.com/ .
• Doctopus, a Google Add-on: Want to work with students in online classrooms? Doctopus makes it easier for teachers to share, organize, and assess student work in Google Drive. Its tentacles copy and "hand out" Drive files to a roster of students, giving teachers full control over starter template, sharing configuration, folder organization and file naming, as well as full visibility over all work in progress -- including the ability to bulk revoke and revert student editing rights. The Goobric Chrome extension works alongside Doctopus to enable rubric-based grading of Google Docs right in a browser popup window using the rubric of your design.  Once a rubric score is submitted, Goobric auto-records scores in your spreadsheet and automatically provides students instant rubric scores and comments via email.  Heck, if it's a Google Document, Goobric even pastes the filled out rubric into the bottom of the Doc.- http://cloudlab.newvisions.org/add-ons/doctopus

• My Attendance Tracker: At least in rural areas, such as where I live, where students learn anytime and anywhere, an online attendance tracker can make a contribution, especially if it’s free! “Setting up students and classes is very easy and you can be off and running in no time at all. Tracking is entirely web-based so you can enter data from anywhere you can access the internet! https://www.myattendancetracker.com/
• Fluency Development: Practice Means Progress (by Susan McShane, M.S, National Center for Family Literacy, Louisville, KY) : Great tips and references to support having adults read aloud. “Many teachers and tutors working with adult literacy learners are unaware of the importance of developing reading fluency. In fact, in many adult learning settings oral reading is not assessed, so learners' fluency deficiencies may go unnoticed. Adult educators have long believed that asking learners to read aloud in group settings is a bad idea—that adults with poor reading skills may be frightened away from programs if they have to put their reading deficiencies on public display. http://proliteracyednet.org/downloads/209fluency.html

Tips for Encouraging Reading and Writing Practice

• An Adult Ed writing instructor who is also an artist told me that she has started to have students create or select drawings first. Then they write about what they drew. Following is a YouTube clip that might support that practice. “Literacyhead.com gathers visual art from artists from around the world and organizes it in reading and writing lessons that are naturally differentiated and engaging. These beautiful, standards-based lessons focus on higher-order thinking opportunities and are perfect for digital presentations. -https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h0ehvCnSV3s (2011)
• Flipbook: Have your students create a Flipbook online with easy instructions. The outcome is very attractive. Beginning writers are invited! - http://www.readwritethink.org/files/resources/interactives/flipbook/ 

Social Media Tips

• Teacher’s Guide to Twitter: “Twitter has proven itself to be an indispensable tool for educators around the globe. Whatever skill level you may be, Twitter is downright fun and worth your time. So here’s a useful guide that we curated from Edudemic’s archives in an effort to put something together that was a bit easier to read than random blog posts. - http://www.edudemic.com/guides/guide-to-twitter/
• Facebook for Community Educators and Leaders: The PDF targets teens and the adults who server them.  http://fbhost.promotw.com/fbpages/img/safety_resources/ffeclg.pdf

Please open a discussion in our community and share your tips for using social media for instruction, especially among adults.

Member Contribution

This section is awaiting your contribution. Share a practice, a resource, a tip, anything that you would like featured in this section! Email me, and you’ll be in our next newsletter!

Brain Games and Fun Things

What phrases do the images represent? Share them with your students!  If you solve the “word puzzles,” post your answer in this forum. Otherwise, wait until next month’s issue for the answers.

1.            2.

3. Check out these words as images at http://pleaseenjoy.com/projects/personal/word-as-image/#image751

Possible solutions to last month’s challenges: 1. Foreign language  2. Go for it.

Upcoming Events

Be sure to drop in weekly to review the exciting announcements on our LINCS Home page,  https://lincs.ed.gov and on our Community page, https://community.lincs.ed.gov/https://community.lincs.ed.gov .

A. COABE 2016 –Registration for the 2016 COABE/TALAE National Conference in Dallas, Texas on April 10-13, 2016 is open! Get registered early and save $!
B. Workforce One's Strategies for Effective State Teaming (Submitted by Michael Cruse, LINCS moderators) – Building a structured collaborative team is the key to great state planning and long-term WIOA success. Learn how implementation teams—from across agencies and inclusive of business champions—are working in Washington and New Jersey to drive key workforce transformation.” Tuesday, December 15, 2015, 12:00pm to 1:00pm. - https://community.lincs.ed.gov/event/workforce-ones-strategies-effective-state-teaming
C. ISTE 2016: “The learning and collaboration at ISTE 2016 can spark big transformations — but it takes more than one person to sustain it. You have the chance to learn together, experience opportunity and support each other as you implement the new ideas you’ve learned. When your group hits 10 registrants, you receive the super early bird rate — no matter when you register for the conference.” San Antonio, Texas, June 25-28, 2017. Website:  http://bit.ly/1O0yWpO

Comments

You are invited to comment on the usefulness of a monthly newsletter. If you would like to post a section, just send it to me, and I will include it if the group would like to continue this practice.

Need help becoming more active? LINCS provides you with “how-to” links to video tutorials when you click the HELP link from your Community page (https://community.lincs.ed.gov/page/help) , along with a “Contact Us” link at the very top of the LINCS window. Just as I am sure you tell your students, “When you don’t know how to do something, ask! My email is posted below.

To respond to any of the items in this newsletter, simply add a comment to this post, as with all discussion threads.

See you in the forums! Let’s talk some more! Leecy
leecy@reconnectioncompany.com