Hi Andrea,

I'm not currently teaching inmates this semester, but I am working with
colleagues on developing a new teaching/research project, so I'll
explain the plan for that project to give you a sense of how I typically
structure my class and I can compare it a bit to work I have done in the
past.  This new project is for a federal women's prison here in TX.  It
is still in the designing and developing stages.  The prison is located
very close to where I live, which is a first for me. I have been
involved with a jail program (NY) and state prisons (MA) both involved
at least 40-90 minutes of commute time. This project has the support of
the warden and Susan Chabot, the Education Administrator of the Federal
Bureau of Prisons (Bill [Muth], I think this might have been your old
job.)  I've never worked with a project with such a high level of prison
administration support.  My colleague developed this project 3 years
ago, and it got shelved by the old warden at the prison.  The new warden
showed interest in the project, they contacted us, and now there is much
support for us to get grant funding and make it happen.

The class is designed to be a part of the parenting education program at
the prison.  Using a book club structure, women will be using children's
literature to develop literacy skills and engage in a series of
activities to positively impact the students' parenting skills and
nurture family literacy efforts between women inmates and their
children.  Women will be both reading and writing children's literature.
We hope to have women reading children's literature that is age
appropriate for their children and aligned to their own reading levels.
Hopefully (we still need Institutional Review Board approval on all of
this) the women will have the opportunity to videotape themselves
reading for their children and will be able to use visiting time to meet
and read with their children.  There is an onsite Children's Visiting
Center.  Two sections of the class will be offered and team taught by
two instructors.  We are anticipating 15-30 students in each class.  We
are also drawing from our community and connections here to have guest
artists, including theater professionals, bookbinding artists, and a
well-known children's book author visit the classes.  Four of us have
been actively involved in the planning and we are all bringing unique
strengths to the design and development process since this is both a
teaching and a research project.  We will be assessing parental beliefs
and practices, attitudes toward reading and writing, and literacy levels
pre-and post the classes. 

In the past, my work has both in classrooms and one-on-one.  In the case
of one-on-one it was more tutoring and mentoring to transition students
from their GED classroom into the prison college program.  And my
classes were literature and writing based, reading and creative writing
classes that could be used for credit in the adult education program,
but could also be taken just for the sake of taking.  

Anyway, I hope that gives you a sense of what I've been up to and what I
hope to do.

Best,
Dominique




-----Original Message-----
From: povertyracewomen-bounces at nifl.gov
[mailto:povertyracewomen-bounces at nifl.gov] On Behalf Of Andrea Wilder
Sent: Thursday, February 15, 2007 2:59 PM
To: Women and Literacy Discussion List The Poverty Race
Subject: [PovertyRaceWomen 512] Barriers, etc

Dominique, I would be interested in knowing about the content of your 
classes, what exactly you do with your students and how you structure a 
class.  How many students do you work with at a time?

Thanks.

Andrea

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