Ventures Community eNews Features

Strategies for Building Community in the Classroom to Support Learner Persistence
By Gretchen Bitterlin

Gretchen Bitterlin has been an ESL instructor and ESL department instructional leader with the Continuing Education Program, San Diego Community College District since 1971. She was an ESL Teacher Institute Trainer and Chair of the TESOL Task Force on Adult Education Program Standards. She is co-author of English for Adult Competency.

One day, I walked into my family literacy ESL class and it was quieter than usual. Delia, who had almost never missed a class, was absent. After I asked if anyone had any problems over the weekend, the students reported that Delia’s 5-year-old daughter had fallen and suffered a brain injury and was in intensive care at the hospital. Within minutes, the students took up a collection to help Delia in the weeks ahead, since she would not be able to work. Among a class of low-income students, $300 was raised in 15 minutes to help out a fellow classmate. I was overwhelmed by the generosity of the students in that class and their networking to help out a fellow student. The incident exemplified the strong sense of community that existed in that class. This sense of community provided an atmosphere that also facilitated learning and persistence at a higher level than I had seen in previous classes.

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Teacher Feature with links
By Ana Sahuagun

Adult Ed ESL instructor
Indiantown Family Learning Center, Florida

Inspired by Her Students, and an Inspiration to Them

Teaching in Guadalajara, Mexico’s second largest metropolitan area, didn’t completely prepare Ana for the challenges she would face in the United States.  For example, the Indiantown Family Learning Center's ESL program uses an open-enrollment model, which means students sometimes "stop out" to earn money, and then they come back to class. It was a challenge for Ana to get used to students “stopping out”. Overall, however, Ana has found the Adult Ed ESL teaching experience to be the most rewarding of her lifetime. She has seen individuals go from having low levels of literacy to becoming intermediate students of ESL.  The majority of her students are female, and she encourages them to become active members of their community.  She wants them to build their self-confidence and be able to function without relying on their children as translators.

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Goal Setting Made Realistic
By Sylvia Ramirez, Noncredit ESL

A Collection of Gifts, Issue 2, Fall 2006
Reprinted with permission

A Collection of GIFTs is a collaborative effort of MiraCosta's Writing Center and Teaching Academy.

Recent research on learner persistence emphasizes the importance of working with students to set short and long term goals. In ESL we ask our students, “Why are you coming to school?” and they inevitably answer “to learn English.” However, this answer does not help them focus on specific steps they need to achieve that nebulous desire. Goal setting helps students identify realistic goals that are achievable within a certain period of time. Then students can move step-by-step through the activities to achieve the goals. They own the process and the results.

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Teacher Feature
By Masha Gromyko

Assistant Program Manager,
Pima Community College Adult Education, Tucson, AZ

Challenging Students with High Standards

The Pima Adult Education Eastside Learning Center has four different programs: ESOL, ABE/GED, the Refugee Education Project, and RAISE (for the mentally and physically challenged). The center is international in scope, with 40 different countries and languages represented. Students' skills and knowledge are just as varied as their backgrounds. Some never had the opportunity to attend school in their home country, while others were professionals before emigrating to the U.S. One Pima teacher describes their program as a "mini-U.N.": by coming together to learn a language, students learn about each other, and hopefully this knowledge will someday break down cultural barriers and lead to a more peaceful world.

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Projects, Persistence, and the Workplace: How are they related?
By Donna Price


Former Lockheed Martin CEO Norman Augustin said, “Most innovations today involve large teams of people. We have to emphasize communication skills, the ability to work in teams and with people from different cultures” (Wallis and Stepton 2006). Project-based instruction in ESL is a way to develop these skills, since it includes working in teams, communicating, and getting along with people from different backgrounds.