RaPAL conference in wales this year

It is time to start thinking about the RaPAL conference again. Tannis went in 2007 and we both went last year.

Click here to read more about last year's trip on this blog and here to read about some of the other things we did in Ireland on my story juice blog.

As you can see, the RaPAL conference is a great time. Lots of fun and lots of learning in a relaxed and congenial atmosphere.

Here is the information that the good people at RaPAL sent:

Dates: 26-27 June 2009 with a free pre-conference event on 25 June.
Place: University of Wales, Newport
Theme: Sustainable Literacies
www.literacy.lancs.ac.uk/rapal/conference/conference%202009/Announce2009.htm

The call for papers is at the website and the deadline is March 20th.

We would like to invite conference participants to apply the idea of sustainability to literacies. Workshop themes could cover the following issues:

• Practice, research and policies that sustain a variety of literacies and languages.
• Practice, research and policies that avoid ‘quick fix’ solutions and promote long-term development of literacies.
• Practice, research and policies that support literacies as a sustainable community resource as well as individual skills.
• How can digital technologies support and develop sustainable literacies?
• Sustainable literacies in local, national and global contexts.
• How can literacies sustain and support individuals and communities in times of changing social, environmental and economic conditions?

...We welcome proposals from new presenters and will be happy to offer advice and support if you have not presented at a conference before.

Newport is a former Victorian industrial town between Bristol and Cardiff which flourished as a port, docks and steel town until the 1970s. It subsequently lost these core industries but is now recovering as a lively and attractive city with developments such as new bridges, an arts centre, the establishment and expansion of the University Of Wales, Newport, city centre regeneration and other projects.

Please put the dates in your diary now.

Read about last year's conference in Galway here.

hippy hippy rapal

Sorry for the long absence. I got home from my travels late last Tuesday to find that my internet connection was down -- or mostly down. No excuse really. There is always the internet café just a 5 minute bike ride away. The internet was not the only thing that was down. I was sort of down too. I have been on the move for three weeks and was not ready to stop. I wanted to keep going and felt a bit grumpy about having to come home and stay in one place for more than three days in a row. All better now. Still want to move around and am making plans but can probably settle down for now.





The RaPAL conference ended so well. My last day I went to two amazing workshops. I spent the morning with Julie Collins who told us about a variety of storytelling projects. She has worked with a diverse range of people -- striking miner's wives, travellers, street involved people and now me.

In the afternoon Canada's own Bonnie Soroke told us about her work with HIPPY (Home Instruction Program for Preschool Youngsters). Bonnie is the coordinator of the HIPPY plus program at HIPPY Britannia in Vancouver. The HIPPY Plus program combines the traditional HIPPY program with an adult literacy program. The program acknowledges that all parents have levels of competency in different literacies and builds on those strengths to broaden the boundaries and deepen community connections using non-text and creative methods. Bonnie told us we could use art supplies to take notes and reflect on what we were learning. Something that resonated with me was when she told us that one reason some of these parents are isolated from parts of the community is lack of access to transportation. I used play dough to make some rides for them. Later she told us that the HIPPY Plus workers wanted to come to the conference but could not because of costs. That resonated with me because I always feel a seesaw of glad-I-have-this-opportunity and sad-that-others-do-not when I get to attend a conference, especially one that involves travel and hotels. I made a plane for the HIPPY plus workers and am sure they will share it with all of us.

jostling discourses

The Panel Discussion at RaPAL was about the professionalization of literacy teachers, facilitators, instructors or, as they are known here, tutors.

The first thing we were asked to was to generate a list of qualifications we felt necessary to be a literacy teacher. The list was mostly things such as compassion, empathy, flexibility, openness, collegiality, the ability to think on one's feet, the ability to work from where people are, the ability to adapt constantly and so on. The panel seemed pretty surprised that our list was made up of almost exclusively what they called "soft skills" or personal qualities rather than the "hard skills" such as subject matter knowledge. The practitioners objected to the use of the term soft skills because they felt it demeaned what they see as vital to the work. I found it interesting that the list we came up reflects what literacy students say they value in literacy teachers -- they rarely mention subject matter knowledge. We were speaking the language of literacy and our literacy wisdom was on parade.

The rest of the conversation included some of these points:

• professionalization gives practitioners a career path with options and mobility
• a professionalized workforce will garner more respect from policy-makers and the public allowing the field to have a stronger, more effective advocacy voice
• the terms and approaches to achieve this voice means we are using the master's tools to dismantle the master's house and where does that leave us
• the reason practitioners are not respected is not because we are not professionalized (certified, accredited) but because the people we work with are not respected, because we are a female dominated field
• there is a big difference between professionalization and professionalism

The we went to a dinner where the Lord Mayor greeted us and a senator danced with a practitioner.

ancient literacies

I visited the Book of Kells exhibit at Trinity College. One of the first exhibits were examples of the old Irish script called Ogham. Ogham writing looks like a long vertical line decorated with cross hatches. There are 20 letters named for trees. Pretty nice.

With the introduction of Christianity to Ireland came the Roman script and the transcribing of the books of the Bible in the Book of Kells, the Book of Armagh, the Book of Durrow, the Book of Mulling and the Book of Dimma. The Book of Kells was transcribed by Celtic monks around 800 CE and contains the four Gospels of the New Testament in Latin. It is an illuminated text decorated with an extraordinary array of pictures, interlaced shapes and ornamental details of great beauty and delicacy.

After looking at the books and videos about the binding and inscribing processes, you can go upstairs to see the Long Room. The Long Room is an absolutely beautiful library containing the oldest books in Ireland. In the 1800s the library was full so they raised the roof in order to accommodate more books. I am not sure why but it feels almost cosmically wonderful to enter this room and stroll its length.

Last night Sheila Rosenburg opened the RaPAL conference with a talk about English and why people can't, don't and won't learn English. She finished by speaking about whose language is English, referring to the history of colonization and imperialism that brought English to so many places and imposed new names for everything on the people who lived there. Ireland is, of course, one of those places. In the play Translations, Brian Friel depicts how as the British Army mapped Ireland linguistically as well as geographically, as they renamed everything, they were conquering the land from within and using language as a means of oppression. As Sheila was talking about how imperialism then and now intersects with the practice of teaching English in different places, I wondered what it might feel like to be an Irish ESOL instructor teaching newcomers the language that came to my country in such a brutal fashion but has been and continues to be used so beautifully and creatively by a legion of great Irish authors. What place in history do we teach from? Is it the same every day and in every classroom?

quick note

I am in Galway now.

I am late getting going but I awoke early to an car or shop alarm and then slept in a bit. I chose to keep the noisier room with the balcony rather than move to a quieter, non-balconied room with wireless. I am a little proud of myself for that. I am sitting on the stair landing to write this.

I want to tell you about the Book of Kells and the Long Room and the Lisbon Treaty but the bus for Rossvael leaves in an hour and I hope to be on it and then a ferry to Inis Mor. Whee!

edupunks in ireland

I am heading to England tomorrow to do some visiting and reconnecting with family and friends before Tannis and I meet up in Galway for the RaPAL Conference.

I am so happy and grateful for this opportunity. If you are going too, we'll see you there.

I wish we could take you all with us. We'll do our best to bring as much of what we see and learn as we can to you here in the café. And to promote a cross-Atlantic crazy wisdom parade.

Posting might be a little erratic but we'll be thinking of you every minute.