ELL Assessments

BEST is one of several English Language Literacy Tests.  More can be found from a post we put on our wiki.

Student Support and Counseling

Tutors often play a counseling role in volunteer programs, and some use administrative volunteers or paid staff to provide student support.  Some call this person a Persistence and Transition Specialist.

At last week's program management workshop sponsored by VALF, the question came up from a tutor, "How much time should I spend talking with my student during the tutor session?"  What do you think?  Add your comments here.  To post a comment, click on the word in small print below "comments" and share your thoughts on this.

To get readings on counseling, go to our wiki.

Complete our Survey

Please fillout our suvey by the end of September.
Thanks,
Sandy Newell

Adult Education Conference (ACE) Next Week

Next week is the Adult and Community Education Conference at the Daytona Beach Hilton.  In the past, most sessions have been very school/classroom focused, but it is a good place to see publishers.  You probably could visit the publishers without registering.  It is pretty pricey...  The event runs September 20-23.  This is one of two conferences for programs serving those without a high school diploma.

Learner Persistence

Persistence was a hot topic at VALF's program management workshop last Saturday.  A new web site compiles many resources on persistence including a program assessment worksheet.  Take time to evaluate your program using the research based persistence worksheet at the site.

Math Lessons and Literacy

The newest Mixing In Math newsletter is about activities librarians and parents can do with their children that focus on math activities.  This one is all about building and becoming an engineer. Tutors could build literacy lessons around the newsletter, and a parent could go home and replicate the activities with their child.  There is even a certificate for each activity that parents could give their children.

If you need to know more about the GED Math test, take a look at this fact sheet.  It has information on the calculator and links to other math sites on the Internet.

Complete our poll today... Let us know your training needs.  Also, add comments to our blog with more specifics.  Do you need to know about math and the GED?  Let us know.

Social Networking Tools and Literacy

On Saturday VALF presented a workshop on program management.  One topic covered was communication and the need to use a variety of tools because we all have a favorite ways to send out and get information.  If our programs use different methods more tutors, administrative volunteers and students will be reached.  Some of us still favor old tools like phone, e-mail, letters.  Others, especially younger folks use tools like this blog, facebook, wikis...  If you want to know more about social networking, go to our wiki .  Also, please add comments here about how you use (or don't use) various ways of communicating.  Please include links to examples you have found...
Sandy Newell,
President, VALF

Student Involvement

Let us know about your training needs by completing our survey by the end of September.

The Florida Literacy Coalition is sponsoring their student ambassador program for another year.  Travel and training is free for this November 6 training in Orlando.  Give your students an opportunity to give back to your program.  They can speak to groups, recruit students and tutors and raise funds and more.  We posted the announcement about this training on our wiki at http://literacyflorida.wikispaces.com/Student+Stories.

Students can play a variety of roles in addition to ambassador.  They can evaluate your program, coordinate student support groups, buy books, call students to provide support and more.  Please share how students are your involved in your program in the comments section of this blog.