the art of measurement

Background: I am working on a project about reporting requirements and accountability frameworks in adult literacy in Canada.

My coworker was just in New York and went to the MoMA. She saw the Marcel Duchamp sculpture called 3 Standard Stoppages. She described it to me and as she did, I started to see why she thought that this sculpture would resonate with me as I am doing this work. One of the things Duchamp did when building the sculpture was dip a metre length of string in ink and let it drop into what ever shape happened. Each shape was different but each one was a metre. If you cannot see that it is a metre, it is not because it is not a metre, it is just that you are not used to seeing metres that way.

Ahhhhhhhhhhhh! Immediately I felt better. Thank you M. Duchamp. Thank you art. Thank you Tannis.

Here is what it says on the MoMA page:

It is "a joke about the meter," Duchamp glibly noted about this piece, but his premise for it reads like a theorem: "If a straight horizontal thread one meter long falls from a height of one meter onto a horizontal plane twisting as it pleases [it] creates a new image of the unit of length." Duchamp dropped three threads one meter long from the height of one meter onto three stretched canvases. The threads were then adhered to the canvases to preserve the random curves they assumed upon landing. The canvases were cut along the threads' profiles, creating a template of their curves creating new units of measure that retain the length of the meter but undermine its rational basis.

As it pleases!

Music.

...undermine its rational basis!

Poetry.

across the pond

Are you curious about what's happening in adult literacy research in practice in the British Isles? Do you have some funding for travel? Consider the annual conference of Research and Practice in Adult Literacy (RaPAL)!

This year's conference will be held at the National University of Ireland in Galway, Ireland, from June 19 - 21.


The theme is "Inclusion and Engagement in Adult Literacy, Numeracy and ESOL". Workshops will focus on the following areas:

• Approaches to teaching and learning that include a range of learners with different interests, aspirations and needs.
• Engaging with new technologies.
• Literacy, language and numeracy practices and engagement in communities
• Policy and practice: the challenges and opportunities for engagement and inclusive learning.
• Inclusive practices in research in literacy, numeracy and ESOL.

If you want to offer an interactive workshop, take part in a panel discussion or present a poster, please send a proposal by March 14 to: kieran.rapal@cgvec.ie.

And if you will miss the event, you can read about it in a future issue of the RaPAL Bulletin.

blatant hypocrisy

While the governments at all levels like to say that they support literacy for First Nations people, their actions speak louder than words.

This week the First Nations Technical Institute announced that funding cuts may force them to close. Established in 1985, FNTI is highly-regarded and successful. However, it does not receive direct operational funding as other colleges and universities in Ontario do. Now the federal and provincial governments are squabbling over who should fund it.

The UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People (which Canada did not sign) includes the following:

Article 13 - Indigenous peoples have the right to revitalize, use, develop and transmit to future generations their histories, languages, oral traditions, philosophies, writing systems and literatures, and to designate and retain their own names for communities, places and persons. … States shall take effective measures to ensure that this right is protected…

Article 14 - Indigenous peoples have the right to establish and control their educational systems and institutions providing education in their own languages, in a manner appropriate to their cultural methods of teaching and learning… States shall, in conjunction with indigenous peoples, take effective measures, in order for indigenous individuals…to an education in their own culture and provided in their own language.

Please help FNTI fight for equity. Sign their online petition.

being clear

If you've never read George Orwell's "Politics and the English Language" (1946), you're missing a treat. He argues that too many writers don't bother to "[pick] out words for the sake of their meaning and [invent] images in order to make the meaning clearer." Instead, they "[gum] together long strips of words which have already been set in order by someone else".

Orwell's view is that these all-too-pervasive habits can lead to careless thinking, as writers can get bogged down in familiar phrases on their way to seeking exactly how to express what they want to say. More dangerous, he says, is the way in which this type of writing is used in politics.

In our time, political speech and writing are largely the defense of the indefensible. Things like the continuance of British rule in India, the Russian purges and deportations, the dropping of the atom bombs on Japan, can indeed be defended, but only by arguments which are too brutal for most people to face, and which do not square with the professed aims of political parties. Thus political language has to consist largely of euphemism, question-begging and sheer cloudy vagueness.

His essay is a call to "send worn-out and useless phrase[s]...into the dustbin, where [they] belong. It also includes a useful checklist for writing clear prose.

Check it out!

testing, testing

I've recently been enjoying reruns of Laverne and Shirley, a 1970s tv show about two women who work in a beer factory in Milwaukee. The two lead characters are roommates, and the show centres on their lives, friends, neighbours and families.

I enjoy the show because it's about working people, and the best episodes include a lot of word play and physical comedy. Until the show Charmed debuted in 2006, Laverne and Shirley was the longest-running series featuring women as the lead characters.

What does this have to do with adult basic education? This week I saw an episode from the 5th season (1979-1980) called "Testing Testing". It included several moments that spoke to our current reality.

The premise of "Testing, Testing" is that all employees must undergo a psychological test. They aren't told the reason for the test or what the test is meant to measure. All they know is that they've been asked to draw a house, and they will each be interviewed individually by the psychiatrist. Laverne, Shirley, Lenny and Squiggy are worried. They hate tests.

Laverne is worried about her drawing, because both her hands are swaddled in bandages...earlier that day she got cut when she took an unsafe bottle off the assembly line. She didn't report the injury, but she explains how it happened to her friends. As she recounts the accident, her friends remind her of the workplace jargon she should use instead of her vivid descriptions.

In the interviews with the psychiatrist, each character tells their life story and how they came to be doing the kind of work they are doing. Each is heartbreaking in its own way. Laverne lacks confidence. Lenny and Squiggy drive trucks because they don't have a lot of other choices.

At the end, the psychiatrist reports what he has observed...that we should respect and value the work that common folk do. While his 'research' has been completely unethical, the episode was worth watching for the fact that it showed so much about education, power and working lives. Check it out if you get a chance...

manitoba initiative

Last fall, the Adult Secondary Education Council (ASEC)Manitoba started publishing a new journal. The inaugural issue of the Journal of Adult Learning in Manitoba features several interesting articles, including:

• a history of adult literacy work in Manitoba
• a practitioner's account of how her classroom has changed since she began approaching literacy as social practice
• an article outlining how instructors can teach chemistry when they work in a site with no lab
• a history of ASEC, which links teachers in adult high schools

The stunning artwork on the cover is by designer Kae Sasaki.

These days, it's rare to get good news about adult literacy work. How inspiring to see this new initiative from Manitoba. Long may JALM prosper!

broad strokes

These days I'm thinking a lot about what 'counts' as research in practice (RiP), mostly because I'm in the midst of work on the next issue. Our theme next time is "The State of RiP". We chose this theme because people are wondering what will happen to RiP now that it is no longer a priority for federal funding here in Canada.
Perhaps we've boxed ourselves in by thinking that RiP is mostly projects with start dates and end dates, research questions and 'deliverables'. Research is so much more than that. I'd like to share the broader definition of research, phrased so well by Richard Darville in our inaugural issue:

all the ways in which people concerned with adult literacy practice re-search – look again, articulating and clarifying what they know, and pushing out into the unclear and the unknown.

What would it mean to think of RiP as this sort of re-search? Here's more from the same article:

When we begin to connect a broad understanding of practice with a broad conception of research, the first thing we recognize is that much of practice already includes research. It is research when teachers experiment with learning materials, with the phrasing of explanations, or with learner involvement in program organization, and make findings about what works. It is research when practitioners carry on discussion and debate, seeking to share and to clarify their understandings, or to pose and address problems. It is research when people drafting and testing plain language documents come to new understandings of reading processes. It is research when practitioners and policy makers observe and reflect on how administrative arrangements work.

So research is a normal part of ongoing good practice. But of course when people conventionally speak of research, they mean something different and more formal than this – inquiries that are deliberately planned and conducted, and that result in some writing (or taping or filming) and public communication of their results.

The next issue of Literacies will explore whether the current funding situation is helping broaden our ideas about what counts as RiP, or simply making people feel their work is even more devalued.

What are your thoughts? I'd like to hear from you!

Source: Darville, Richard (2003). Making Connections. Literacies #1

supporting RiP

This piece was created by Yukon artist Jo deBeaudrap for the Focused on Practice research project. Here's some of what Jo learned from being involved in the research:

RiP participants expressed both frustration and gratification about their field. They wrote about the need for community support, for building a foundation and finding new ways to do things. Some expressed frustration at being surveyed when time and money are stretched thin....
Working on the piece I thought about how literacy affects the social and economic development of individuals. The impression that I have is that the challenges for the worker are often similar to the challenges of the learner: time, money, support and staying motivated.

The Framework project outlined all of the barriers that make research in practice difficult. More importantly, perhaps, it also articulated a strong vision for how research in practice strengthens literacy work, and the best ways to support this vital work. Research coordinators Jenny Horsman and Helen Woodrow are clear that RiP includes "not only practitioners carrying out research but also reading research, reflecting on practice in the light of research, and changing their practice as a result of research and reflection" (p. 11). Here is what the researchers concluded about the best ways to support RiP:

Research in practice will thrive within an infrastructure that strengthens both the literacy field and RiP itself. It will flourish if governments, funders, administrators and institutional providers recognize the realities of literacy work and value and support practitioner knowledge and methods of strengthening and developing that knowledge. Here is what this means:

...Infrastructure that strengthens RiP:
• Awareness raising
• Funding for all aspects of RiP (locally and nationally, including various ways to engage with research, for short and longer-term studies)
• Support for reflective practice as a precursor to RiP
• Readily available and flexible seed money, sabbaticals and other structures that would free up time to plan and carry out RiP
• Training (both face-to-face and face-to-face combined with online formats; topics including introduction to reflective-practice, recognizing the role of research in everyday practice, and all aspects of RiP)
• Mentors (face-to-face and online, both local and from other regions)
• Flexible ways for provinces and territories that are new to RiP to learn from other regions and to develop locally appropriate models
• Support for dissemination in varied formats (including Literacies and other print vehicles, online sites, and face-to-face methods)
• Networks (local, regional and national)
• Gatherings (local, regional and national)
• Resources (easily accessible for both newcomers to the field and experienced RiP practitioners) (p.18)

Which of these are supported? Which are neglected?

the state of RiP

The next issue of Literacies will focus on the state of research and practice (RiP).We chose this focus because many people have serious questions about what will happen to RiP in the current funding climate.

Last year's groundbreaking study, Focused on Practice, revealed that research in practice (RiP) is "essential yet close to impossible, given the state of the adult literacy field" (p. 105) in Canada.

For the study, practitioner-researchers in each province and territory, and an Aboriginal researcher, collected data about the state of RiP. Together the whole group analyzed the data. The central findings are explored in Chapter 6 of the book (pp. 105 - 117). Here is what they found were the central reasons why RiP is so contradictory:

• We want to read research and engage in it, we just can’t spare the time or find the energy
• Even so, or because of this, RiP is needed more than ever before
• We must do RiP because we are so isolated, yet our isolation makes it impossible to do RiP!
• Given the state of the field, RiP is essential, but the state of the field limits the value of RiP!
• We are wary of research yet we use research skills all the time
• RiP might lead to change, but would we like all the changes?

Over the coming weeks, we will share more about these findings, and what a range of people are saying about these contradictions.

evolving literacies

These days adult literacy work is a delicate balancing act between what people in our programs say they want and what funders say they should do. Since before Canada was a nation, education has been used to build a particular kind of society. As Harvey Graff writes in 'The Moral Bases of Literacy':

Approved books spread the doctrines of order, harmony and progress, ignoring conflict and inequlity....one key role for literacy. Yet we must also recognize that the child did not need to be proficiently literate to read and comprehend the moral message and thus be instilled with the desired values. At mid-century, before silent reading was valued as a pedagogical tool--and for some years thereafter--oral reading dominated the classroom...

In a recent essay, educator Emilia Ferreiro points out that the biggest technological development in the history of reading was not the printing press but the separation of text into words, paragraphs and chapters using spacing and punctuation. She argues that:

Texts written during the classical period were made to be 'spoken out loud' just like a sheet of music. And, also like music, the letters were the least of it....What really counted was the interpretation. And then came social control over interpretation--a badly done reading would become equivalent to heresy a few centuries later....

Silent reading nourished two unforeseen consequences: heresy and eroticism. The new intimacy with the text set off two complementary movements in a single act of complicity: the freedom of the reader, whose interpretation was for the moment out of reach of censorship, and the freedom of the writer, who could allow himself to express, in the intimacy of his cell or his bedroom, what no voice could express out loud.

But, she warns, perhaps the advent of the computer screen will have even greater impacts on literacy and society. Reading on computer screens "transforms the act of reading into a public act" and requires readers to assume rigid postures to relate to text. What does this mean? Ferreiro believes that

The real challenge is that of growing inequality, for the chasm that separates the illiterate from the literate has grown ever wider. Some have no newspapers, books or libraries, while others are flying with hyper-text, e-mail and virtual pages of nonexistent books. Will we be capable of coming up with policies to reverse this growing inequality? Or will we let ourselves be carried away by the vortex of competitiveness and profitability, even though the very idea of participatory democracy perishes in the process?

Great questions.


Sources:
Ferreiro, Emilia, “Past and Future of the Verb ‘To Read’”, in Past and Present of the Verbs to Read and to Write. Toronto: Groundwood, 2003, pp. 37-56.

Graff, Harvey J., “The Moral Bases of Literacy: Society, economy and social order”, in The Literacy Myth: Literacy and social structure in the nineteenth century city. New York: Academic Press, 1979, pp 21-48.

a thought to start the week

may my heart always be open to little
birds who are the secrets of living
whatever they sing is better than to know
and if men should not hear them men are old

may my mind stroll about hungry
and fearless and thirsty and supple
and even if it's sunday may i be wrong
for whenever men are right they are not young

and may myself do nothing usefully
and love yourself so more than truly
there's never been quite such a fool who could fail
pulling all the sky over him with one smile

e. e. cummings

Bread and Roses

As we go marching, marching,
in the beauty of the day,
A million darkened kitchens,
a thousand mill lofts gray,
Are touched with all the radiance
that a sudden sun discloses,
For the people hear us singing:
Bread and Roses!
Bread and Roses!

As we go marching, marching, we battle too for men,
For they are women's children, and we mother them again.
Our lives shall not be sweated from birth until life closes;
Hearts starve as well as bodies; give us bread, but give us roses.

As we go marching, marching, unnumbered women dead
Go crying through our singing their ancient call for bread.
Small art and love and beauty their drudging spirits knew.
Yes, it is bread we fight for, but we fight for roses too.

As we go marching, marching, we bring the greater days,
The rising of the women means the rising of the race.
No more the drudge and idler, ten that toil where one reposes,
But a sharing of life's glories: Bread and roses, bread and roses.

Our lives shall not be sweated from birth until life closes;
Hearts starve as well as bodies; bread and roses, bread and roses.

James Oppenheim (1882-1932)

According to the Calgary District Labour Council, " Bread and Roses was written during a strike of women textile workers in Lawrence, Massachusetts, in 1912.

"27,000 women went on strike for a 54-hour week with no loss of pay(the previous working week was 56 hours).They spoke over 27 different languages among them and marched every day to keep up their morale. Their banners called for bread and roses, and a poet among them wrote these words,which went on to become a famous song for women trades unionists everywhere.They were on strike for eleven weeks and eventually won the reduction in their working week, a reduction that gave them money in their pockets as well as a better quality of life for their families, not just bread, but roses, too."

Hope this tune carries you through Labour Day.
We'll be back on September 4th.

speakers' corner

In the interests of dreaming big...


The Adult Learning Knowledge Centre recently announced a call for proposals for projects to "bring innovative and informed speakers to address the general public about wide-ranging adult learning issues". Their priorities for funding are:

• literacy
• seniors learning
• arts and culture, and
• prior learning assessment and recognition.
  

So often in adult literacy work we're put in a position of reacting to what other people say about literacy and learning. Here's an opportunity to offer the public a broader perspective on literacy. Or to initiate dialogue with someone who might help us build interesting connections beyond the literacy community.

The Speakers Program accepts applications any time and makes granting decisions at the end of every month.

Interested? Check out the Adult Learning Knowledge Centre webiste.

tenderness

A few weeks ago, a colleague from Scotland wrote to me. She said that this blog

is a reminder for me that adult literacy work is going on, not just in the UK but in several parts of our world and this makes me wonder why? I'm sure that all the different countries have differences in their education systems... Is there some common bad practice we all share? Or is it more simple -- is it just a case that too much emphasis is placed on reading and writing? I must admit that a lot of the people I have worked with have got through their lives with very limited or basic reading and writing skills, and that a lot of the stress they feel is about the stigma and feeling inadequate or, more specifically, not normal.

Her words sum up what literacy workers do: work with compassion each day towards a more inclusive society. Sadly this work is often unrecognized.

Here's a thought to bolster your spirits in time for International Literacy Day, or the start of the academic year. It's from Becoming Human by Jean Vanier:

The belief in the inner beauty of each and every human being is at the heart of...all true education and at the heart of being human. As soon as we start choosing and judging people instead of welcoming them as they are -- with their sometimes hidden beauty, as well as their more frequent visible weaknesses -- we are reducing life, not fostering it. When we reveal to people our belief in them, their hidden beauty rises to the surface where it may be more clearly seen by all. (p.23)

Literacy in peacetime

At midnight on Tuesday, the British Army ended the longest continuous campaign in its history. Although 5,000 troops are still in Northern Ireland, the army’s peacekeeping role is officially over.

Hearing the story on the news this morning made me think about what I learned about literacy work when I was in Belfast this summer. Some initiatives, such as the Literacy and Equality in Irish Society project, have been funded by EU money allocated specifically for peace and reconciliation. But many practitioners are working in other ways and have used powerful creativity to help individuals, and society, move forward.

A group called Families of the Displaced, Dispersed and Distressed (FODDD) came together specifically to heal from the trauma of violence in 2000 in the Shankhill Road area. Facilitated by Sharon Bailey, FODDD integrates arts-based and literacy activities to support the healing process.

At Workforce Training Services in West Belfast, tutor Brid Shields found that students she worked with didn’t realize that Shankhill was very close to where they lived. Brid invited the students to learn more about their community. They did so by creating the West Belfast Alphabet. To outsider eyes perhaps the P (Protestant), Q (Quarrel) and Y are the most accessible letters. Brid talked about how some letters didn’t make it to the poster – an S for Suicide, dripping with blood, and H for Hanging, for example – but did lead to helpful discussions about creating a more healthy and inclusive community.

A few presentations at the RaPAL conference were papers that tutors had written for their diploma in Adult Literacy and Essential Skills at Queen’s University Belfast. Una Cox worked with students to explore what slang meant, and how it reflected people’s different social positions. Together they learned about how and why people use slang, how people judge one another based on their language choices, and how slang terms for people from different social groups affects the people who hear it.

In Northern Ireland, literacy work is often seen as a way to deal with inequality, poverty and social exclusion. Programs are targeted to areas with the greatest need, based on a scale of “social deprivations”. Although they are called Essential Skills classes, the arts and personal transformation are integrated and valued in programs.

Canada could learn from this approach!

literacies everywhere

One of the most exciting things I observed in Scotland last month was that literacy work is...everywhere! Groups that define community in various ways offer adult literacies. This means that some tutoring happens in the community where a person lives, and other support is integrated in programs that link to other ideas of community.

For example, the Glasgow Women's Library offers adult literacy tutoring but also works hard to make all of their programs accessible to women, no matter their formal education. Another example is the Glasgow Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Centre, which aims to be a truly inclusive space that recognizes and meets "varied needs in a climate of trust and respect". Learning is one of its basic services and the literacy project recently completed a book of student writing.

Offering literacy in community sites is one way of ensuring that what adult students learn is "relevant to their own context and everyday literacy practices." How does this work in practice?

As in many parts of Canada, literacy workers are hired for part-time, contract positions and are not paid for preparation time. Most literacy practitioners work in isolation and have few chances to get together with others to share what they are doing and what their questions are.

In this photo, Gerry Green and Anne Strain admire woven accordion books we made together. Anne volunteers as a tutor assistant at the Glasgow Women's Library while Gerry is a literacies tutor who works, on contract, at several sites.

The current campaign in Scotland is the first time in 20 years that adult literacies work has been supported in any significant way. One of the biggest challenges of the campaign was finding people to do the work.

The development coordinator at Learning Connections, Fiona MacDonald, wrote in Literacy Today that "Training opportunities had been rare, often unaccredited and with few routes for progression." In conjunction with the Scottish Qualifications Agency, Learning Connections developed accreditation for tutor assistants.

Here are the objectives for the unit called "Preparing to work with adult literacies learners." Tutors should be able to:

• Explain and reflect on the social practice approach to adult literacies learning.
• Explain and reflect on the roles and responsibilities of learner and tutor.
• Explain and reflect on approaches to building confidence and motivation in adult literacies learners.
• Explain and reflect on approaches to supporting the learning process with adult literacies learners.

Learning Connections has also developed a qualification for tutors of English for speakers of other languages with a focus on literacies. They are working on a post-secondary program for adult literacies tutors in Scotland.

But what does all of this accreditation mean? Work in adult literacies continues to mean part-time, contract work. Sound familiar?

the scottish approach

Greetings from Scotland! I still have lots to learn about adult basic education in Scotland, but am heartened by the official statements about literacy (which is always referred to in its plural rather than singular form). Adult literacies work is seen as part building "strong communities". I'm sure in the coming days I'll learn more about how everything works, but here is how Communities Scotland describes the work:

The Scottish approach to adult literacies adopts a social practice model, which sees literacies as a key dimension of community regeneration and a part of the wider lifelong learning agenda. Such an approach recognises that:

• literacy and numeracy are complex capabilities rather than a simple set of basic skills
• learners are more likely to develop and retain knowledge, skills and understanding if they see them as relevant to their own context and everyday literacy practices.

Tutors are encouraged to negotiate an individual learning plan, selecting the knowledge and skills that are most relevant to the individual learner's goals.

Learners are expected to work on their actual goals. They are not expected to try to fit what they want into criteria set by a central authority. How sensible! How refreshing! How is it working in practice? Stay tuned!

who benefits?

In a few weeks I will be in Belfast at the annual conference of Research and Practice in Adult Literacy (RaPAL). I've been pondering how to convey the realities of literacy work on this side of the Atlantic.

I've also been reading Valuing Literacy: Rhetoric or Reality (Detselig, 2006). This book reports on research by Veeman, Ward and Walker comparing adult literacy in Canada and Sweden. I like the succinct summary included in their conclusion:
In Canada, adult literacy is an individual rather than a community problem and it is dealt with as a charitable cause. There is no universal publicly-funded system of adult basic education to provide compensatory education for adults in any jurisdiction. Instead, undereducated adults must avail themselves of a patchwork of volunteer programs or projects offered by community-based organizations. There is no reliable schedule of adult learning opportunities, nor do all Canadians have access to funding for study at the basic level. The charity nature of literacy and the name literacy itself are disincentives – and often a disservice – to adults who might lack self-confidence or need special help in addressing learning needs. (p.102)

The aim of the research was to explore why Canada and Sweden fared so differently in the OECD's 1994 International Adult Literacy Survey, which found that "adult literacy levels in Scandinavia were significantly higher than those in English-speaking countries." What did the researchers conclude?

The social democratic approach of Northern Europe sees adult education as a public investment that helps raise the educational level of the whole society for the benefit of all. This is in contrast to the economic and social policies of Anglophone countries, where the emphasis has been on sustaining meritocracy rather than on producing social equity. Literacy in countries such as Canada is seen as the individual’s problem to be solved, and the rampant individualism that has damaged trust, fairness, and social bonds has not served to raise literacy levels. (p. 105)

I've often thought that adult literacy programs in the UK had enviable levels of infrastructure and sustained support. At RaPAL I'm sure I'll learn more about how conditions in Ireland, England and Scotland might be similar to Canada. I'll use this space to share what I learn!

Beading and reading

Last weekend I went to a workshop at the Woodland Cultural Centre. It was led by Sam Thomas, an Iroquois beading artist, and Munuve Mutisya, founder of the Akamba Peace Museum in Kenya. They are working together on a project that will be displayed at the United Nations this summer -- The Great Tree of Long Leaves.

There are fascinating parallels between the beading traditions among the Akamba and Iroquois. Both used beaded belts to record significant events (as in the Akamba replicas on the right in this photo and in Iroquois wampum). Colonization was actively hostile to these practices in both cultures.

This kind of cultural reclamation is not usually included in mainstream definitions of literacy work. It should be.

- Tannis