Teaching Adults Reading and Writing
Reading & Writing Strategies for Adult Learners
Teaching Adults to Read
by S. Rapatalo, various authors
Reading is a complex task and unlike children in thier early school years, adults do not have long hours to dedicate to learning to read. Teaching reading is specific, intentional and includes the following tasks:
- phonological awareness
- word analysis
- sight word recognition
- encoding
- oral reading fluency
- text comprehension
- writing
Little research is available on the most effective methods for teaching reading to beginning-level adults, but the following links/articles are a step in understanding what strategies are effective in teaching reading. If there are reading strategies that you have tried and were sucessful in your class for literacy students, please share at smckay2@schools.nyc.gov.
Think Literacy: Cross-Curricular Approaches, Grades 7-12
by Think Literacy
In order for students to be successful, they have to understand how to read increasingly complex informational texts. The ability to understand and use information in these texts is key to a student's sucess in learning. The following document includes a repertoire of strategies to help students engage and interact with the text for better comprehension.
Before Reading Activities
by S. Rapatalo, various authors
Before reading, good readers preview and think about the text in context. If a student is a struggling reader, pre-reading activities may engage the student prior to the lesson, activate prior knowledge allowing students to make a connection to the text and teachers are given the opportunity to teach or review difficult vocabulary students may encounter.
The following activities are suggestions to help engage students with pre-reading activities. If there is a strategy that you use that has been effective for your students, please send to the following email address: smckay2@schools.nyc.gov
During Reading Activities
by S. Rapatalo, various authors
While students are engaged in a text, it helps to pause and think about what the text is stating. For struggling readers, especially those who are fluent with low comprehension, during reading strategies help students to recall information, make connections to predictions/inferences/etc and students begin to understand thier purpose for reading the text.
The following activities are suggestions to help engage students during reading. If there is a strategy that you use that has been effective for your students, please send to the following email address: smckay2@schools.nyc.gov
After Reading Activities
by S. Rapatalo, various authors
After reading a text, good readers take the time to back track what the text was about and find ways to evaluate/synthesize/summarize necessary information. After reading activities allow teachers to access what students know or have learned and what next steps to take in thier instruction.
The following activities are suggestions to help engage students synthesize information after reading. If there is a strategy that you use that has been effective for your students, please send to the following email address: smckay2@schools.nyc.gov
Writing Strategies for Adult Learners
by S. Rapatalo, various authors
Unlike most subjects, which require primarily that students take in new information, writing requires that students to put it out. Every time a student writes a piece (essay, blog, summary, response to literature, etc.), we expect them to produce something new that they have never produced before. Even when we've given them some input like a prompt or a question or a theme, thier success is determined by the output that develops when what we've given them is significant and appropriate.
The following are suggestions for writers at all levels in different contexts and content areas. If there are writing strategies that you use in your classroom that have been successful, please share them at smckay2@schools.nyc.gov