What you are describing is ideal. Unfortunately, this often does not happen. The reasons why youth attend our programs and older adults attend are sometimes very different. For example, some 16 year olds attend because they found out that they only need to attend a few times a week for a few hours in order to get a GED and they find this option more attractive than attending high school every day for many hours (of course this is not true for many 16 year olds who attend our programs). Older adults often attend because this is the only option for them to attain the literacy skills they want to attain. There are also important developmental differences between 16 year olds and people over 40. These issues can get in the way when it comes to behavior management issues.
Daphne


>>> "Katherine" <kgotthardt at comcast.net> 3/8/2008 8:14 AM >>>

Why do you think age is a problem?  Don't you see it as a way to get 
perspective from people who have lived through different historical, 
cultural, and personal events?

Katherine Mercurio Gotthardt
www.luxuriouschoices.net 
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Daphne Greenberg" <alcdgg at langate.gsu.edu>
To: <povertyracewomen at nifl.gov>
Sent: Friday, March 07, 2008 6:00 PM
Subject: [PovertyRaceWomen 1838] more from WE LEARN Conference



>I am currently listening to Meizhu Lui's keynote address on wealth and 

>poverty issues and she is describing the intersection between economic, 

>racial, and gender issues. This reminds me of some of the points brought up 

>in our discussion last week. We all wear intersecting identities, and we 

>need to remember this when we think about learners. Our learners' 

>experiences are very different depending on how their different identities 

>intersect. For example, a learner who is an African American poor lesbian, 

>has a very different life experience compared to a learner who is an 

>African American poor heterosexual. A learner who is a poor Latina, first 

>generation US born, has a very different experience from a poor Latina new 

>immigrant.  All these issues impact on access to services and ability to 

>benefit from the services.

>

> One type of diversity that we haven't talked about is age. Our adult 

> literacy programs have become very heterogenous in terms of age. Diversity 

> of age can create quite a bit of prolems for our classrooms. 17 years olds 

> who are recent drop outs and 50 year olds sitting side by side in an adult 

> literacy classroom can present quite the challenge. I am wondering, if 

> anyone would care to share the problems that they have faced with diverse 

> ages in the classroom? Does anyone care to share strategies that they have 

> used with diverse ages in the classrooms? And how does age intersect with 

> other aspects of diversity?

> Daphne

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