Leveling The Playing Field
May 1, 2008 by John Tashima
Leveling The Playing Field
By John Tashima
This paper outlines the need for basic skills instruction, arguing that such instruction is necessary to meet the needs of a continuously evolving economy and the demands that such an economy makes on its workers. What is most convincing and interesting about this paper is how it gets into the specifics of these needs and demands.
There are three groups of students in need of basic skills instruction: students who lack sufficient English speaking skills, students with good English skills but without a high school diploma, and students with a high school diploma but who lack sufficient basic skills for the workplace. Basic skills allows these students a clear path to a high level of literacy. A significant portion of our workforce in the coming years will come from the immigrant population; by incorporating effective basic skills instruction, we can ensure that this population remains a valuable resource for our growing economy.
What constitutes basic skills has changed over time based upon the evolving nature of the economy. For example, in the past, a living wage could be earned with low levels of education because many of the workers were akin to artisans, learning their trades in hands-on apprenticeships. Now, instead of being able to evaluate a system by listening to the machines and feeling the cloth that comes out of them, workers need the ability to monitor computer systems that perform quality control. Workers need to be able to read manuals and work from them, perform simple calculations and adapt to changing situations.
In response to these changes, the Department of Labor Secretary’s Commission on Achieving Necessary Skills (SCANS) has expanded the definition of basic skills. This definition has been expanded to include the ability to:
- Read at the ninth-grade level or higher
- Use math at the ninth-grade level or higher
- Solve semistructured problems when hypotheses must be formed and tested
- Work in groups with coworkers from different backgrounds
- Communicate effectively, both orally and in writing
- Use personal computers to carry out simple tasks like word processing (13)
The connection between literacy and oral language skills is another reason to teach basic skills. Speakers with higher levels of literacy tend to “provide more of the details that a listener needs to fully understand a complicated situation” (12). Highly literate speakers tend to be able to use language more effectively to describe what can’t be directly experienced. This particular use of language is valuable in the modern workplace, where the discourse is “more like the oral discourse in school, a discourse that is modeled on writing” (13).
Competence in basic skills is also important to an individual’s non-working life. The reality of everyday life is more complicated than in the past; the average person needs to monitor electronic finances, retirement plans and health plans in a way that was unheard of a generation ago. A parent’s level of literacy also has a marked effect on the child’s ability to read. Educated parents are far more likely to provide their children with support (such as reading to them, teaching letters, visiting a library) in the crucial first three grades. Literate parents create an environment in which reading is seen as natural and important and, by extension, create a view of school as a “familiar and friendly environment” (16). This leads to what is called the “Matthew effect,” which refers to the “rich get richer and the poor get poorer” idea in the New Testament book of Matthew. If we don’t intervene and see to it that the entire population reaches a certain level of basic skills competence, we risk creating an underclass whose lack of skills leaves it “beyond the reach of opportunity and on the margins of civic and social life” (24).
Finally, basic skills is important because it will help create the informed, politically active population that is necessary for a successful democracy.
Comings, John; Reder, Stephen and Andrew Sum. “Building a Level Playing Field: The Need To Expand and Improve the National and State Adult Education and Literacy Systems.” NCSALL Occasional Paper.
2001.
http://eric.ed.gov/ERICDocs/data/ericdocs2sql/content_storage_01/0000019b/80/19/82/3c.pdf
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John, your review of this paper puts the need for Basic Skills in perspective. I have a greater sense of urgency about helping my students make progress. An important element of that is making sure that they continue in the program (both in the School of Continuing Education and at the credit campuses) until they reach ninth grade level skills. Gabriela Menendez’s comment on the videos provides the inspiration and motivation to be the teacher I need to be to keep my students on track.
John, thank you for your review. The information provides a concise look at the needs we face in our country as well as among our students. Sometimes the challenge seems overwhelming to meet, and this concise perspective reminds us that we cannot wait.
John, Great summary and necessary to remember that most of our students at this point are really just trying to get by and nead real life English! I want my Ss reach a level of self-confidence which translates to self-worth in their every-place – not only workplace – and that means giving them first speaking tools to feel more accepted in this Southern California complex and critical culture. One thing I tried recently was to send Ss out of the classroom to observe and then return with a report of what they saw on the CEC campus. This was for about 2-3 minutes. They all responded amazingly and were delighted to be REAL. Sometimes maybe we think too much academically or theoretically and need to memember to simplify. Maybe more answers are right in front of our noses.
Susan, Linda, Pat, thanks for your comments.
Your words suggest the tug-of-war I felt when I was reading this paper. On the one hand, we want to help prepare our students for college and the bright future that a good education implies. On the other hand, many of our students simply won’t make it to college or aren’t interested – they really just want to be able to communicate in English and participate in what is truly our “complex and critical culture.”
Helping our students communicate in “real life” English, I think, will always be our first priority as ESL teachers. We’ll need to keep this in mind no matter how big the Basic Skills snowball gets.
Setting aside the rationale that basic skills “will be good for employers,” an underlying reason that smacks of misplaced priorities in the classroom, there is still a point made in the paper that had particular resonance with me. It is the idea of the “Matthew effect.” In the basic writers courses I teach at Cerritos, I have to wonder if my students aren’t a product of that effect. Many of them are second generation Americans from a poor socioeconomic background, perfectly intelligent but lacking the basic skills to make it in college. I can only speculate, but would things be different for some of them if their parents had instilled the view of reading as “valuable and important” that more educated parents might have? We know that the way demographics are going, these students, the sons and daughters of our students, are our future. If you’re inclined to believe that we’re already headed in a “rich get richer and poor get poorer” direction in this country, the prospect of their falling further and further behind is frightening.
I’ve heard many instructors comment that students who were highly-educated in their home countries do well because they know how to learn. Teachers complain that some students just don’t know how to act in a classroom. These are things we can help our students with. Basic skills can mean, for example, figuring out the main idea of a reading – which helps the student infer, predict, comprehend and connect with the text. We’re not preparing our beginning students for college specifically, but we are preparing them to learn.
Some instructors already do these things – but many don’t. Basic Skills isn’t telling us anything new, really. Its best practices are already being, uh, practiced by many teachers. That’s where they came from. What Basic Skills will be most helpful with is making the practices systematic – getting instructors who don’t incorporate these elements into their classrooms to see the value of doing so.
That was so well put, that I could almost cry!
This strand is absolutely wonderful! John, you are right on the money with your notions about teaching our students how to learn. This is exactly the purpose of the basic skills initiative. It doesn’t matter what subject area we are talking about, these practices will help all of our students from the very lowest to the highest of levels!
Our students might not have aspirations to go to college, but it is our responsibility to show them why it should be their goal. It is our responsibility as educators to teach them about goal setting, the American Dream and just how to accomplish that dream. Maybe their main goal is to be able communicate in English. That doesn’t mean that they can’t be shown all the opportunities that furthering their education will afford them. Of course, they should be focusing on the curriculum of the class, but good teachers inspire their students to achieve their fullest potential. Are we not here to make a difference in their lives? We can help change their lives as well as the lives of their posterity.
What Pat said about the complexity of Southern Californian culture is spot on. We have a very unique lifestyle here. We have amazing diversity. We have unbelievable wealth and heartbreaking poverty. I see my role as an interpretor to help them make sense of it all and to find and focus on the positive attributes of this culture. I talk about the many subcultures we find here in SoCal and the differences in culture across America. This is a very complex subject area of course, but students who look for the positive (as opposed to one who sees her/himself as a victim) will do better in every area of her/his life.
I do believe that competence in basic skills is also important to an individual’s non-working life. My mother who is close to retirement age would be unemployable since she has a lack of technological experience. These skills along with language use are important for vocational advancement.
We seem to be talking here about college-bound students vs. many in our student population whose highest aspiration is to become a manager in a restaurant. What we need to remember is that most restaurants use computerized cash registers to keep track of inventory. Managers have to communicate with their supervisors. Most companies require written reports at all levels. So whether college-bound or not, to get ahead, our students have to master basic skills.
Very interesting reading! The workplace is ever changing and employers are looking for employees who have more advanced abilities. The competition is now global and our students must be prepared for that. This article certainly underscores the urgency of the basic skills project.