These types of materials often focus on students' tranformational vision. 
They also present people who are similar to our students who have struggled 
to succeed against the same barriers and who have succeeded.

Reading and discussing these materials provides an opportunity to improve 
and practice reading and speaking skills, but this activity also allows 
students the chance to discuss their vision for their personal future, the 
new identity they are seeking, which is their true motivation for learning.

Understanding these two types of goals is best done with an example. For 
example, when I first started playing golf, I took some lessons to improve 
my game. The lessons were expensive and it was difficult to get the time to 
both attend the lessons and to do the practice required to make the lesson 
effective. My stated instrumental goal was to start getting a score in the 
90s, a pathetic goal in golf terms but my goal none the less. I also had a 
vision of myself being able to join a group of golfers and be feel 
confident that my game was going to be OK and someday quite good.  It was 
that vision, the one of me hitting the 250 yard drive right down the middle 
of the fairway that kept me going.

Our learners have a vision of themselves. It might be someone they know who 
is also an immigrant but who can always speak English in every situation. 
Or, it might be a friend who got her GED and then went on to medical 
assistant training at a community college and now works in a hospital 
helping people who are sick and who is now talking about becoming a nurse. 
In both cases they want to become that person.

I think learner-generated stories would be good vehicles for articulating 
and connecting to this aspect of motivation.  Along with teaching language 
and literacy skills, this kind of an activity can build critical thinking 
skills as well, by having the discussion follow Freire's "decoding" 
approach. That is, use a logical sequence for the discussion that starts 
with description (what happened in this story), then moves on to analysis 
(why did it happen), personalization (does this happen to you), planning 
(what can you/we do about this), action (trying something out), and 
reflection (what did we learn from the action and what should we do next). 
This allows students an opportunity to practice a process of critical 
thinking that may lead to action that supports persistence and learning.

--On Monday, July 17, 2006 12:17 PM -0400 Cathy Gannon 
<CGannon at qcc.mass.edu> wrote:


> I hope I'm not too late to pose a question - have just gotten caught up

> on this very interesting discussion.

>

> John, Would you please elaborate a bit on "Learner-produced reading

> materials, which many programs produce, at least in small quantities,

> might be useful in this process, but informal dialogue and writing about

> goals might work just as well." in your response to Marie below.

>

> We (here at Central SABES) support a publication of learner produced

> writings and know that the practitioners in our region of MA  would be

> interested in connecting this learner writing to goal setting and thus

> increased learner persistence.

>

> Cathy Gannon

>

>

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

> From: specialtopics-bounces at nifl.gov

> [mailto:specialtopics-bounces at nifl.gov] On Behalf Of John Comings

> Sent: Monday, July 10, 2006 4:01 PM

> To: specialtopics at nifl.gov

> Subject: [This message may be SPAM] [SpecialTopics 100] Re: Fwd: Re:

> Persistence Discussion questions

> Importance: Low

>

> Sorry I'm late responding but I just got into the office after a morning

> of conference calls and family business.

>

> Let me start by saying that the last 8 years of research has given

> NCSALL some insights into what might work to increase persistence, but

> we don't yet have proof that the changes in program services that these

> insights suggest lead to increased persistence.  However, I feel we have

> some of the best available advice. That advice suggests two broad

> approaches, one is to add supports to persistence in our existing

> programs and the other suggests adding those supports to programs that

> are designed to fit with the existing patterns of participation.  The

> first approach is incremental and less expensive. That second requires

> changes in policy, funding, accountability, and service delivery.

>

> Now to Marie Cora's two questions:

>

> 1.  Goals:  The quantitative aspect of our research showed a correlation

> between students who were able to state a specific goal for attending

> (they persisted longer) and those who stated a vague goal or no goal at

> all (they persisted less).  So we explored the goals of students and

> found that they usually expressed both an instrumental goal ("I want to

> get my GED, so I can get a better job" for example) and a

> transformational goal (I want to be the kind of person who has a high

> school education," for example). Many programs ask students at intake to

> state their goals, which is probably helpful. But, it might be helpful

> to weave the goal setting process into instruction as well. In this way,

> students can have some time to think about what they want and why they

> want it. Learner-produced reading materials, which many programs

> produce, at least in small quantities, might be useful in this process,

> but informal dialogue and writing about goals might work just as well.

> Any activities that help students articulate their instrumental and

> transformational goals, and revisit them as part of instruction,

> probably adds this support to persistence.

>

> 2.  Stopout: In our interviews, students who had dropped out told us

> that their program would not allow them to return after they stopped

> attending, but the staff in their programs said this was not true and we

> observed students returning and being welcomed back into the program.

> The misconception started at intake and orientation, when staff

> emphasized good attendance. Our longitudinal study is identifying a

> pattern of participation in learning that is made up of episodes of

> participation in programs and episodes of self-study.  Our research

> suggests that a support to persistence would making sure that new

> students know that they can stopout and also know how to reenter.

> However, we might do better to change the form of participation to one

> that links episodes of program participation and self study.

>

>

>> Begin forwarded message:

>>

>>> From: "Marie Cora" <marie.cora at hotspurpartners.com>

>>> Date: July 10, 2006 10:02:17 AM EDT

>>> To: <specialtopics at nifl.gov>

>>> Subject: [SpecialTopics 90] Re: Persistence Discussion questions

>>> Reply-To: specialtopics at nifl.gov

>>>

>>> Dear Colleagues,

>>>

>>> Thanks so much to John Comings for being with us this week to discuss

>

>>> Persistence.  I am very much looking forward to hearing what

>>> strategies folks use out there to try and tackle this issue with

>>> their students.

>>>

>>> I actually have two questions for you (and list subscribers):  I am

>>> interested in hearing you elaborate a bit on the impact of having the

>

>>> student set his or her own goals, and how best to help them to do

>>> that.

>>> It's quite easy to set a student's goal for her/him - but not so easy

>

>>> to get a student to determine a goal for her/himself.  What are some

>>> of the things that folks do around this issue?

>>>

>>> Second, I heard you speak at a conference last fall in which you

>>> noted that part of what could be helpful in persistence, is to

>>> acknowledge that the student might not persist.  In other words, why

>>> not explore with the student the reality that if they do "stop out",

>>> this doesn't have to mean "quit".  I found this fascinating and at

>>> the same time, completely logical.  This appears to be part of what

>>> you intend in your third area of research based on what I've read.

>>>

>>> Thank you again for your time this week and for the discussion.

>>>

>>> Marie Cora

>>> NIFL Assessment Discussion List Moderator

>>> marie.cora at hotspurpartners.com

>>>

>>>

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

>>> From: specialtopics-bounces at nifl.gov

>>> [mailto:specialtopics-bounces at nifl.gov] On Behalf Of David Rosen

>>> Sent: Monday, July 10, 2006 7:37 AM

>>> To: specialtopics at nifl.gov

>>> Subject: [SpecialTopics 89] Re: Persistence Discussion

>>>

>>> Dear Colleagues,

>>>

>>> Today we begin a discussion about the studies which Dr. John Comings

>>> and others at the National Center for the Study of Adult Learning and

>

>>> Literacy have done on persistence.  The discussion will continue

>>> through Tuesday next week, July 18th.

>>>

>>> Please post your questions and comments to John beginning now.

>>>

>>> In John's message below he describes two publications which may be of

>>> interest.  Each has a short executive summary.   There is also a 30-

>>> minute video panel discussion about the study, with John and two

>>> practitioners, streamed at:

>>>

>>> http://www.nifl.gov/nifl/webcasts/persistence/persistence_cast.html

>>>

>>> You may need to cut and paste the whole web address in your browser,

>>> or you could try this shorter version:

>>>

>>> http://tinyurl.com/s6tcu

>>>

>>> Macintosh users will need to select the Quicktime format for viewing

>>> the presentation, and there are still some bugs to be worked out of

>>> the Mac streamed version.

>>>

>>> David J. Rosen

>>> Special Topics Discussion List Moderator djrosen at comcast.net

>>>

>>> On Jul 5, 2006, at 4:33 PM, David Rosen wrote:

>>>

>>>> Special Topics List Discussion Colleagues,

>>>>

>>>> John Comings, Director of the National Center for the Study of Adult

>

>>>> Learning and Literacy, will join us on July 10th to discuss the

>>>> persistence study he has done. John has written an introduction,

>>>> below, and included links to reports of the first two phases of the

>>>> study. I hope you can read these before July 10th.  You are welcome

>>>> to submit questions, ideas and comments for John beginning now, but

>>>> these will not be posted until July 10th.

>>>>

>>>> i am looking forward to your joining in on this important

> discussion.

>>>>

>>>> David J. Rosen

>>>> Special Topics Discussion List Moderator djrosen at comcast.net

>>>> --------------

>>>>

>>>> When a group of us at World Education were preparing to write the

>>>> proposal for the funds that have supported NCSALL, we surveyed

>>>> practitioners and policy makers around the country to help us design

>

>>>> our research agenda. Almost 500 people participated in the survey.

>>>> We asked the survey participants to send us the questions that they

>>>> wanted answered to help them improve practice in ABE, ESOL, and GED

>>>> programs. One question was at the top of the list for teachers and

>>>> second on everyone else's list. One teacher phrased it this way,

>>>> "Just when they begin to make progress, many students leave the

>>>> program.   How can I keep those students long enough that they can

>>>> meet their educational goals?"

>>>>

>>>> That question formed the basis of a three-phase study of

> persistence.

>>>> The first two phases are complete.  The first phase surveyed the

>>>> literature, interviewed 150 students in the six New England states,

>>>> and identified ways that programs were trying to support the

>>>> persistence of their students. The report of that first phase can be

>

>>>> found at:

>>>>

>>>> <http://www.ncsall.net/fileadmin/resources/research/report12.pdf>

>>>>

>>>> In the second phase, 9 library literacy programs were provided with

>>>> funds to implement interventions that might help improve

>>>> persistence, and our study team observed the programs and

>>>> interviewed their staff and students. We also followed a cohort of

>>>> 180 students for 14 months.  The report of that second phase can be

> found at:

>>>>

>>>> <http://www.mdrc.org/publications/401/overview.html>

>>>>

>>>> We are prepared to implement the third phase, but NCSALL no longer

>>>> has funding to begin a new research project. This next phase would

>>>> test three interventions. One would add persistence supports to

>>>> existing classroom programs, one would use a wide range of modes of

>>>> learning (in programs and through self study on-line and in other

>>>> ways) that more closely match the way adults manage their learning,

>>>> and the third would combine these two approaches. I believe the

>>>> third approach is a promising way to solve the persistence problem,

>>>> as well as it can be solved.

>>>>

>>>> I'm looking forward to your questions, but I would also be

>>>> interested in practical ideas of how to build support to persistence

>

>>>> and how to expand opportunities for learning.

>>>>

>>>> John Comings, NCSALL Director

>>>> National Center for the Study of Adult Learning and Literacy Harvard

>

>>>> Graduate School of Education

>>>> 7 Appian Way

>>>> Cambridge MA 02138

>>>> (617) 496-0516, voice

>>>> (617) 495-4811, fax

>>>> (617) 335-9839, mobile

>>>> john_comings at harvard.edu

>>>> http://ncsall.gse.harvard.edu

>>>>

>>>>

>>>>

>>>>

>>>>

>>>>

>>>> -------------------------------

>>>> National Institute for Literacy

>>>> Special Topics mailing list

>>>> SpecialTopics at nifl.gov

>>>> To unsubscribe or change your subscription settings, please go to

>>>> http://www.nifl.gov/mailman/listinfo/SpecialTopics

>>>

>>> David Rosen

>>> djrosen at comcast.net

>>>

>>>

>>>

>>> -------------------------------

>>> National Institute for Literacy

>>> Special Topics mailing list

>>> SpecialTopics at nifl.gov

>>> To unsubscribe or change your subscription settings, please go to

>>> http://www.nifl.gov/mailman/listinfo/SpecialTopics

>>>

>>> -------------------------------

>>> National Institute for Literacy

>>> Special Topics mailing list

>>> SpecialTopics at nifl.gov

>>> To unsubscribe or change your subscription settings, please go to

>>> http://www.nifl.gov/mailman/listinfo/SpecialTopics

>>

>> David Rosen

>> djrosen at comcast.net

>>

>>

>>

>

>

>

> John Comings, Director

> National Center for the Study of Adult Learning and Literacy Harvard

> Graduate School of Education

> 7 Appian Way

> Cambridge MA 02138

> (617) 496-0516, voice

> (617) 495-4811, fax

> (617) 335-9839, mobile

> john_comings at harvard.edu

> http://ncsall.gse.harvard.edu

>

> -------------------------------

> National Institute for Literacy

> Special Topics mailing list

> SpecialTopics at nifl.gov

> To unsubscribe or change your subscription settings, please go to

> http://www.nifl.gov/mailman/listinfo/SpecialTopics

> -------------------------------

> National Institute for Literacy

> Special Topics mailing list

> SpecialTopics at nifl.gov

> To unsubscribe or change your subscription settings, please go to

> http://www.nifl.gov/mailman/listinfo/SpecialTopics




John Comings, Director
National Center for the Study of Adult Learning and Literacy
Harvard Graduate School of Education
7 Appian Way
Cambridge MA 02138
(617) 496-0516, voice
(617) 495-4811, fax
(617) 335-9839, mobile
john_comings at harvard.edu
http://ncsall.gse.harvard.edu