Hello all
Many thanks to those of you who responded so readily to Judith Boardman’s
request for help in getting going with her MA dissertation. There are so
many crucial topics to choose from when investigating ESOL, which remains
an under-researched area. I’d like to pick up on just one of these now,
that of literacy, more specifically the teaching of L2 literacy to adult
ESOL learners who did not have opportunities to acquire literacy as
children in their expert languages.
I have collected together a handful of references on acquiring literacy for
the first time as an adult, and in a new language, for those of you who are
interested in following this up. There is as far as I know very little out
there on literacy and ESOL. Things are a bit more advanced in the USA: have
a look at the Low Educated Second Language and Literacy Acquisition
(LESLLA) for Adults website: http://www.leslla.org/default.htm
Our recently completed NRDC ESOL Effective Practice Project took some of
its methodology from a study of ESOL literacy in the States:
Condelli, L., H. Spruck Wrigley, K. Yoo, M. Seburn and S. Cronen. (2003).
What Works. Study of Adult ESL Literacy Students. Volume II: Final
Report. American Institutes for Research and Aguirre International.
Washington, DC: US Department of Education.
Our own project will be published by the NRDC later in the year, and I’ll
post a message on this list as soon as it’s out. In our findings we say a
fair amount about ESOL and literacy. We make the connection between the
slower rate of progress of longer-term residents in the UK compared to
newer arrivals. We looked at the profiles of these different groups, and
found that the longer-term resident (5yrs+) group contained a higher
proportion of students who had not had the opportunity to acquire literacy
as children and who consequently have particular L2 literacy needs as adult
ESOL learners. In the summary of our findings we say:
“A clear finding in our study is that relative newcomers have a different
profile and rate of learning from long-term residents and this needs to be
taken into account in designing provision. ... The newer arrivals need
adequate provision now, particularly in relation to (better) employment
practices so that they do not become the future long-term residents facing
more barriers to learning. Similarly, long-term residents need appropriate
provision, including literacy where necessary. For them ESOL classes are
often their first chance to learn English because commitments and
constraints have prevented them from doing so in the past.”
This has been picked up by the NIACE enquiry into ESOL. Have a look at
their interim report at http://www.niace.org.uk/projects/esol-
enquiry/documents.htm
Para 29 p.18 makes the point that “There is also the danger that some of
the resident communities have had limited educational opportunities and may
have no/limited literacy skills (particularly women); they become even more
reluctant to join classes when more recent arrivals have better study
skills.”
One of the NIACE enquiry’s ‘next steps’ is to look at ESOL learners in
literacy classes (p. 47). There is, by the way, still time to respond to
that NIACE interim report (just) – consultation carries on until 31 July.
Have a look at:
http://www.niace.org.uk/projects/esol-enquiry/documents/Annex3.doc
Bynner and Parsons’ NRDC research suggests that the transition from Entry 2
to Entry 3 in literacy has the greatest impact on learners’ life chances,
and this is likely to be equally true for language learners. Reference:
Bynner, J. and Parsons, S (2005) New Light on Literacy and Numeracy:
results of the literacy and numeracy assessment in the age 34 follow-up of
the 1970 cohort study (BCS70). London: NRDC.
It’s also worth looking at Barton, D. and K. Pitt (2003) Adult ESOL
pedagogy: A review of research, an annotated bibliography and
recommendations for future research. London: NRDC. (available online
through the NRDC at www.nrdc.org.uk)
Chapter 4 of Kathy Pitt's book deals with ‘Learning the written language’:
Pitt, K. (2005) Debates in ESOL teaching and learning. London: Routledge.
As Mary Weir says, there is much useful stuff and very many ideas for
possible areas of investigation in the new book from LLU+:
Spiegel, M. and H. Sunderland (2006) Teaching basic literacy to ESOL
learners: A teacher’s guide. London: LLU+.
Apart from that, I know Martha Young-Scholten at Newcastle University is
doing some very interesting work on L2 literacy acquisition for non-
literate adults, specifically asking whether there is a critical period
hypothesis analogous to a more general L2 CPH (Krashen) - though I don't
think anything's published yet.
And finally, here are some more possibly relevant references, again many
form the US:
Alderson, C. (2000) Assessing Reading. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press.
Bernhardt, E. B. and M. L. Kamil. (1995). Interpreting relationships
between L1 and L2 reading: consolidating the linguistic threshold level and
the interdependence hypotheses. Applied Linguistics. 16:15-34.
Burt, M. 2003. Issues in improving immigrant workers English language
skills. ERIC Brief. Washington, DC. Center for Applied Linguistics.
Comings, J. P., H. Beder, B. Bingman, S. Reder and C. Smith. (2003)
Establishing an evidence-based adult education system. Occasional Paper.
NCSALL: Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Cunningham Florez, M. (2003) Working with literacy-level adults English
language learners. ERIC Brief. Washington, DC: Center for Applied
Linguistics.
Huntley, H. S. (1992). The new illiteracy: A study of the pedagogic
principles of teaching English as a second language to non-literate adults.
ERIC No. ED356685.
Shameem, N., K. McDermott, J. Martin-Blaker and J. Carryer. (2002). A
Report on the Literacy Grains of Low-level and Pre-literate Adult Learners
in Literacy Classes. Executive Summary. National Association of ESOL Home
Tutor Schemes, Inc. School of English and Applied Linguistics, UNITCE
Institute of Technology Centre for Refugee Adult Education, Auckland
University of Technology. Auckland, New Zealand.
Cheers!
James
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