(sorry if this is a repetition -- I changed email accounts this morning and sent this from the old one at first)

Hello Steve,
Thanks for being in the discussion and for such an intereting study  I'm struck by two things, based on my experience in several adult learning centers:  first, how on earth did you manage to keep in touch with such a high percentage of your subjects, and second, how do they manage self-study when they usually can't manage homework?

These may seem like frivolous questions, but for my program they go to the heart of the question.  We find it very difficult to contact students after they have "stopped out" -- phone numbers and addresses change and we have neither the time nor resources to keep up.  In these circumstances, do you think making resources available to support self-study would help us retain contact, or would simply be a waste of time and effort?

Secondly, my students have a great deal of difficulty completing homework because of their life and work situations.  I can understand that self-study will often fit better into their difficult and often-changing situations, but I wonder about the wisdom of putting time and effort into resources that would at best (in my view anyway) be only intermittently used.

I hope you have positive answers -- I'm sure self-study goes on, and in fact I've seen it when people have studied for themselves over a summer and return in the fall more skilled than when they left.  It just seems an extremely tricky subject from an institutional point of view.

Unfortunately I will be away for a few hours, but I'll be back during your workday, anyhow!

Wendy Quinones

  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Steve Reder 
  To: focusonbasics at nifl.gov 
  Sent: Monday, January 22, 2007 10:59 AM
  Subject: [FocusOnBasics 601] introduction


  Hi everyone,

    Let me introduce myself and our study a bit.  I'm Steve Reder.  I'm a professor of applied linguistics at Portland State University.  My research and teaching interests center around how adults develop literacy and language abilities.  The project we're discussing this week, the Longitudinal Study of Adult Learning (LSAL), has been following a sample of about 1,000 adults from the target population for adult education over the past 8-9 years.  There are a couple things that make this study unique within our field.  We are following adults who may or may not participate in adult literacy education programs rather than just program participants.  We periodically interview our "panel" of subjects -- and assess their literacy skills and practices - regardless of whether they are in programs.  We conduct in-depth qualitative interviews with some of individuals to complement the more formal interviews and assessments, helping us to interpret the patterns of change we see in the quantitative data.  When individuals move - as they often do - during the course of this longitudinal study, we attempt to follow them.  So far we have retained and continued to follow about 90% of our original sample over this long period of time, even though some individuals have moved away, a few may have gone to jail or prison, many experienced major changes in family and job situations, weathered a significant recession, and in general displayed great richness and diversity in their unfolding adult lives.

    The LSAL data give us a new view of the learners who come to programs as well as of their counterparts who do not come to programs.  This gives us a broad perspective on individuals' decisions to participate or not, and over time, a new perspective on patterns of participation and other learning activities as people move in and out of programs.  From what we are seeing so far, there is a "swirl" of learning activities that surrounds programs, with adults engaged in a rich variety of learning experiences to improve their basic skills or prepare for the GED.  Some adults in this "swirl" come to our programs, whereas others may not because of job, family or other constraints.  By considering this broader "swirl" of learning activity, we see higher rates of participation and more persistence of learning than if we take the more traditional program-based view of learning.  We are trying to think about how programs may be able to broaden their outreach and support of these additional learners and this additional learning.  

    Here are a few questions to think about as we discuss this issue of FOB.  Have you had students in your programs who move in and out of participation because of changing needs or life circumstances?  Have you tried to find ways to stay in touch with and support them even when they stop coming to class?  Have they told you about friends or family members who would like to come to classes if other things weren't getting in the way?  Have you tried ways to "blend" activities in your program with learning activities that students could carry out on their own?  What role do you see for technology in blending program- and self-directed learning activities for improving basic skills?

  -Steve Reder    

    

    



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