The message below is cross-posted from the National Literacy Advocacy 
Discussion List.  It talks about some of the work in Pennsylvania in 
developing standards for curriculum.
Aaron



>Date: Thu, 06 Apr 2006 06:14:27 -0400

>From: "Martin E. Senger" <mesenger at netbox.com>

>Subject: Re: [AAACE-NLA] Curriculum Policy Proposals

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>Cc: mpeters at gecac.org, Sara Brennen <sbrennen at pennswoods.net>,

>  "Westover,     Michael" <mwestover at state.pa.us>

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>Pax et bonum all! (peace & goodness)

>

>I teach Adult ESL for a non-profit in northwest PA (GECAC), and I am

>currently involved in a three-year project with the PA Dept of Education

>(PDE) to develop statewide curriculum standards. We are in the third year of

>the program, implementation. We have spent the last two years establishing

>and defining what we wanted in our standards, using Maryland and Arizona's

>standards as a starting place.

>

>You should know that the group of about 20 who participated is made up of

>ALL adult ESL teachers from across PA and from a variety of agencies, so we

>make up a good representation of the professional field in the state.

>

>Our basic goal was to create a document that would give both novice and

>experienced teachers a basic "guideline" of subjects to teach and times to

>teach them. We avoided it being too "prescriptive." We spent a long time

>hashing out the exact schedule, especially when it came to teaching grammar.

>But we had an excellent group, and we worked it out. We used six main

>sections: (in no particular order) Speaking, Listening, Writing, Reading,

>Pronunciation and Grammar. We also listed cultural and civic aspects for

>each level.

>

>We used the new NRS levels: Beginning Literacy, Beginning, Low Intermediate,

>High Intermediate, and Advanced.

>

>We aligned our standards to NRS, CASAS and BEST. I have since returned to my

>own previous assessments (BEST) for my students, and aligned them to our

>standards. It has been very helpful in seeing exact scores for each of the

>six sections.

>

>We discussed at the beginning that we could never form a comprehensive and

>prescriptive curriculum due to the fact that takes way too much power out of

>the teacher's hands. We stressed that these are suggestions, since the

>teacher should know what is best for the student.

>

>But we also underscored the desire that when a student changed agencies (in

>Erie, that happens on a daily basis), all the agencies would be literally

>"reading off the same page" when it came to assessing students' levels.

>

>I hope I have done the PA Curriculum Standards justice in this brief

>description!

>

>Martin E. Senger

>Adult ESL Teacher

>The R. Benjamin Wiley Learning Center/GECAC

>

>-----Original Message-----

>From: aaace-nla-bounces at lists.literacytent.org

>[mailto:aaace-nla-bounces at lists.literacytent.org] On Behalf Of David Rosen

>Sent: Tuesday, April 04, 2006 9:53 PM

>To: National by AAACE Literacy Advocacy List sponsored

>Subject: [AAACE-NLA] Curriculum Policy Proposals

>

>AAACE-NLA and Program Leadership Colleagues,

>

>  From time to time government agencies at the federal and state level

>fund programs to develop curricula.  For example, for several years,

>through the U.S. Department of Education's Workplace Education

>Program, federal grants supported the development of workplace-

>specific or industry-specific basic skills (including ELL) curriculum

>for workers.  I think that it is useful for federal, state and local

>government agencies to fund curriculum development.  I wish they

>would fund more curriculum projects, both generic and industry-

>specific, in all areas of adult education and literacy (which

>includes ELL and numeracy.)

>

>However, there are two things I would like to see government agencies

>require, that grantees:

>

>1. Develop the curriculum against a set of curriculum standards or

>frameworks.  Given that we do not have federally-approved standards,

>national curriculum projects should use EFF standards, SCANS

>competencies, or possibly CASAS competencies, or a set of state-

>approved  curriculum frameworks. State and local curriculum projects

>could use state-approved curriculum standards.  Exceptions could be

>made for curriculum projects which use a participatory curriculum

>development model where a curriculum is developed from the

>interaction of a teacher and a particular group of students, growing

>from that particular group of students' needs.

>

>2. Publish the curriculum in a government-sponsored curriculum

>database on the Web where anyone (especially teachers) could  quickly

>find it, using a set of adult education curriculum categories, and or

>search terms.

>

>I have recently been searching for some specific workplace

>curriculum, and have been surprised to find how much time it takes to

>chase it down.  I am sure this curriculum exists; it is just not easy

>to find.  And when I have found it, it is rare that the curriculum

>was developed against a set of curriculum standards, or at least it

>isn't clear what the curriculum standards are.  I have often found

>that the curriculum is no longer in print.

>

>Why do I bring this up here?  There are two reasons:

>

>1) This is a public policy issue.  I would like to see the U.S.

>Department of Education, the U.S. Department of Labor, HUD, and other

>federal government agencies, and all state agencies which fund adult

>education and literacy curriculum development adopt this as a policy.

>It would add value to government-funded projects if others could

>benefit from the curriculum development work.  It would not cost much

>to create this web-based database or to maintain it.

>

>2) I would like to hear your reactions to these proposals, for

>example from a program improvement (curriculum improvement is part of

>program leadership) and from a public policy perspective.

>

>David J. Rosen

>Adult Literacy Advocate

>djrosen at theworld.com

>

>

>

>

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Aaron Kohring
Coordinator, LINCS Literacy & Learning Disabilities Special Collection 
(http://ldlink.coe.utk.edu/)
Moderator, National Institute for Literacy's Content Standards Discussion 
List (http://www.nifl.gov/mailman/listinfo/Contentstandards)
Coordinator, Equipped for the Future Websites (http://eff.cls.utk.edu/)

Center for Literacy Studies, University of Tennessee
EFF Center for Training and Technical Assistance
Phone:(865) 974-4109 main
           (865) 974-4258 direct
Fax:   (865) 974-3857
e-mail: akohring at utk.edu