Literacy scholarship has established the importance of teaching, supporting, and facilitating digital literacy education for 21st century students. Stuart Selber goes a step further, arguing that students must be functionally (using digital technology), critically (questioning digital technology), and rhetorically (producing effective digital…

For art educators, teaching textual literacy can be a challenge. In a review of literature, Hall (2005) found that content area teachers (as opposed to teachers of Reading and English) did not feel qualified to teach reading and believed that students did not need reading instruction to be successful with texts from their specific disciplines.…

For many writing faculty, electronic or digital literacies may not play an overtly significant role in their course designs and teaching practices, but these literacies still play a significant role in how students write. Whether or not writing teachers want to accept it, functional computer literacies are an important aspect of teaching writing.…

Functional literacy is important in both English/language arts and geography. Using the "found poetry" strategy, students will summarize a piece of text, identify main ideas and find geographic connections. While using young adult literature is a great way to incorporate geography into English/language arts classroom, understanding of geography…

This article proposes a four-component framework for understanding the literacy of individuals with visual impairments, and defines two levels of literacy--basic (or academic) and functional (or practical) literacy. Implications are drawn for development of self-advocacy skills, development of standards for judging literacy in this population, and…

The literacy training strategy of the Brazilian educator Paulo Freire has gained a great deal of recognition over the past 15 years. In Freire's method, the context of the learner's life is carefully studied to find the critical issues in the formulation of dialogue between teacher and learner. A basic vocabulary then is generated to insure power…

Documents produced for three separate conferences that were convened to discuss the aims and methods of English instruction in the past century demonstrate the pedagogical shift from a "formal" concept of literacy to a more functional one. An 1896 conference at Harvard University reviewed secondary school and college English instruction during the…

Comprising a study of the application of linguistics to literacy, the 16 papers in this book were prepared by contributors from both developing and developed nations. The papers in the first section illustrate the relevance of certain developments in theoretical and applied linguistics, sociolinguistics, and psycholinguistics to literacy teaching.…

Reading disability is described in this paper as a relative state that will appear different across societies and over the years. It is noted that researchers who claim that their objective is to find methods and materials to make remedial reading unnecessary are unrealistic. An overview of the Danish educational system and society during the last…

This pamphlet is the result of working papers prepared for the 1969 UNESCO meeting held to analyze problems associated with implementing an experimental world literacy program. Functional literacy is distinguished from traditional literacy as being an integral part of the economic and social development of the area in question, not isolated or an…

This annotated bibliography consists of materials in the ERIC system that deal with teaching English as a second language to persons who are illiterate, or functionally illiterate, in their native language. The items in the bibliography were obtained by means of a computer search of "Currnt Index to Journals in Education" and "Resources in…

These lesson plans for the adult learner result from two regional UNESCO workshops held in Indonesia in 1989 and Pakistan in 1991. Prototypes of exemplar instructional materials for primary education, literacy and continuing education programs were developed and tested during the workshops. The lessons focus on the need to introduce population…

This training manual is designed for use by volunteers, tutors, teachers, and education and training program coordinators who wish to adapt basic literacy instructional skills to street youth. It is not intended to be a stand-alone training program for new volunteer tutors. Major goals are the following: (1) to re-engage street youth in the…

A conference was held to discuss concerns in adult education for women, in India, where only 18 percent of the women, compared to 40 percent of the men, are literate. A major theme of the conference was motivation--how does one motivate women to attend literacy education? For what reasons should they become literate? Many women see no need or have…

Three abstracts and seventy-five acquisitions related to adult literacy are presented. A few of the acquisition entries are in French. The abstracts are of the following: "Directory of Organizations Offering Literacy Training Courses," by the International Institute of Adult Literacy Methods; "Directory of Universities and Institutes Offering…