1. Commentary on the traditional paradigm
2. Re-defining post-literacy
3. Critiquing the new approaches
4. Policy implications and action
Women's income-generating group Kenya
The traditional mode of PL: We are conscious of those changes which have been and continue to be introduced into adult literacy learning programmes in developing countries, especially within the last few years. Nevertheless, in many places very little has changed. On the basis of the field visits and the literature review conducted during the research project, it would seem that the large majority of ILT and PL programmes are built upon a traditional approach to literacy. 'Literacy' is seen as a process by which a set of technical skills of reading, writing and numeracy are acquired through a classroom-kind experience, working with a teacher (facilitator) and a textbook or other 'learning' materials. Once grasped, it is assumed that these skills can be applied in all kinds of contexts to cope with many different forms of print-based learning - they form what may be described as a 'portable toolbox'. The approach is similar to that of primary school: it asserts that one needs to learn literacy first and apply it in practice afterwards. Literacy is seen as a pre-requisite for further learning and development programmes. Without literacy, the participant groups are felt to be severely disadvantaged.
This 'literacy comes first' model rests on a number of assumptions that are questionable. It is founded for example on a deficit view of illiteracy. It accepts without questioning the idea that autonomous learning and development activities can only start after the acquisition of literacy skills. It is based on the view that 'illiterates' are excluded from most of the worth-while activities which other members of their own communities engage in. It assumes that literacy skills are required by all individuals, and that the acquisition of such skills will be of benefit to all who acquire them. It is based on the view that literacy skills are developed in a sequential process, and assumes that the acquisition of such skills brings with them clear advantages in thinking and reasoning and learning abilities and in relating to the outside world.
And literacy acquisition is closely associated with schooling. The process of learning literacy skills associated with these assumptions is based upon a limited and specially prepared group of learning texts (usually primers) which are received by those who attend the literacy classes. It is concerned with 'learning' but not with the use of these skills.
The implications of this view for post-literacy are that PL
· consists of a further programme of learning,· is aimed at those who have completed the initial literacy teaching programme
· uses materials prepared specifically for this group of learners,
· and leads in the end to the independent use of the technical skills so acquired in a wide range of different contexts and for a wide range of different purposes.
The same programmes then are being offered in much the same way with much the same kind of materials (up-dated, of course, but along the same lines) as have been offered for the past twenty or more years. In the absence of any clear and proven alternative, ILT-providing agencies continue with few exceptions to offer the same menu. Although the pace of change is increasing, the traditional paradigm is still dominant.
The strength of the traditional paradigm of literacy
The strength which the traditional paradigm continues to have on existing ILT and PL programmes needs to be explained. We are forced to ask, when there are so many innovatory approaches to PL and so many challenges calling for new approaches, why it is that there appears to be so little change in both ILT and PL.
We would suggest that a number of factors come together to restrict change.
1. Policy: First, there is a lack of clarity among many of the major decision-makers in relation to PL. The fact that the practitioners are engaged in controversies about the goals and objectives of PL prevents the development of clear objectives. The responsibilities and agendas of the different parties involved are frequently divided. Policy-makers and funders are reluctant to commit resources to making changes in an area of work where the aims, the measures of achievement, and even the demand from the participants are either obscure or disputed. There is no clear vision; the messages relating to PL are mixed.
2. Resources: In any case, there has been significant investment in the traditional paradigm - both structural and emotional investment. Major changes to PL would call for alterations in ways of operating, even job losses (as well as job creation), and for an admission that some of the actions taken so far have not yielded the fruit which was promised. It is hard for some administrators to make such admissions and changes. There has also been substantial investment in some countries in printed texts which need to be used. The pressure to use the existing systems is strong.
Such investment is however in most cases informal rather than formal. For in most countries, PL lacks an institutional form, both at central and local levels, which would enable it to make quick changes of direction or develop pilot experimental projects. In India, the TLC established for a short time an infrastructure for PL, but this was strictly time-bound, and in most areas no longer exists - which is why the National Literacy Mission is seeking to establish a network of Community Education Centres throughout the whole country and to graft them onto the existing state adult education agencies. However, the experience of Tanzania, with its highly developed PL programme and its network of Folk Development Colleges, shows that something more than an infrastructure is needed for the development of a sustainable PL programme with innovative and locally relevant activities.
For, almost universally, PL programmes and activities are under-funded. In some countries, there is no budget at all for PL; it has to draw on the resources of other bodies such as various Ministries or government agencies which provide development services or on donor support alone. In other countries where provision is made for it, it has to compete against other priorities. The current concern for children's primary schooling militates against adult literacy and PL in particular. The follow up to the Education for All Programme launched in 1990 is almost entirely towards the education of children and young people in school or out-of-school programmes, so that 'Education for All' has now become 'Education for All Youth'; adults are being increasingly neglected. Botswana is not the only country where the Department of Non-Formal Education which concentrated on adult literacy programmes is now being asked to develop non-formal schooling programmes for out-of-school youth. Further, structural adjustment makes PL a prime target for cuts. When it is felt that a sector of development is not necessary or that it exists primarily to remedy the failures of other programmes (in this case, it has been argued that PL exists to prevent relapse into illiteracy which shows that ILT has not done its work properly), then it does not augur well for its survival at the hands of Treasury officials. Lack of funding and constant fights within the bureaucracies prevent those responsible for PL from moving forward, however much they would wish to do so. There are very real constraints on existing PL programmes (Torres 1998).
3. Discourse: Equally the current discourse is so strong. Literacy is seen as 'education' (rather than social practice), and PL therefore as 'more education' (Omolewa 1998 p1). The rhetorical language of the old paradigm is still dominant among donor agencies and is therefore repeated among those bodies seeking funding and other resources. Even when the discourse changed (for example, to include Freirean rhetoric), the new discourse was quickly incorporated into the old discourse, for example, that 'literacy (per se) empowers'. In particular, staff training programmes, where they exist, have reinforced the old discourses among the field workers. UNESCO has not helped by the slowness with which it has come to terms with the New Literacy Studies. We note that although PROAP/ACCU criticises the older paradigm of PL, it still produces didactic texts which it intends to be universally applicable through context adjustment rather than being context produced (ACCU 1996, 1998). So that policy-makers, looking to those international agencies which are thought to specialise in these fields, have not received the guidance which they need and deserve from such bodies.
4. Lack of evidence: Fourthly, policy-makers, conscious of accountability, are asking for the evidence that new approaches to PL will produce greater levels of achievement: 'will it work?', particularly in the sense in which they measure achievements, the increase of literacy statistics.
It is difficult to point to many examples of new approaches to PL making notable achievements. The general conclusion is that which Benton has expressed: "Although it is possible to point to some particularly compelling experiments, no single strategy has gained a solid reputation for effectiveness" (Benton 1996 p95). We have indicated above some of the significant but relatively small-scale innovatory approaches, and we are conscious that more exist. But there are few means for publicising such activities. There is currently no journal devoted to the practice of adult literacy in developing countries, although several countries and regions have developed their own newsletters such as RaPAL in the UK, The Spider in East Africa, the Indian Journal of Adult Education, etc, which may promote some exchange of practical information on ILT and PL. There is no international outlet to help busy administrators to access evaluations of these pilot schemes.
And most new approaches appear to be so localised as to be threatening to national administrators, and so small-scale that they are felt to be unlikely to help with a problem which is seen to be so large-scale. There is frankly little to convince policy-makers that any new paradigm may be more effective. The REFLECT programme and the Nepal Community Literacy Project will be two of the major influences in this respect. While the first of these shows signs of yielding considerable results, although not perhaps the spectacular results which have been claimed for it (Dyer and Choksi 1997), the second of these has hardly begun, and it will be some time before its effectiveness can be assessed and measured in non-traditional terms.
What is more, many of these experimental approaches come from younger or more junior staff within the adult literacy hierarchy, largely because they are closer to the field and are more conscious of the weaknesses of the traditional paradigm. However, this tends to mean that they have less power to bring about changes on any significant scale within their own organisations. And the pressure they exert on their supervising staff does not commend their new approaches to those who have the power and resources to bring about effective change.
Again, because many of the experiments are young, they have not yet been able to demonstrate that - even when they can bring about change - they are capable of maintaining that change. A longer period is often required to convince policy-makers that some desired change is both feasible and sustainable.
Nor has it been proven beyond shadow of doubt that the existing paradigm has in fact failed. Its problems can be (and often are) represented as being practical rather than structural, which a programme of amendment will solve. To lose so much when with adjustments the programme could perhaps be made to work is a major motivation to keeping the existing approaches to PL going. It is apparently felt that the ship can be repaired rather than scrapped.
But even if any of these new approaches can be shown to be more effective in terms of local literacies, such approaches are felt not to be able to contribute to the main agenda of governments and most of the international agencies, the assessment of national literacy levels by statistics for comparative purposes. Most countries feel the need to reduce their national and gendered figures for illiteracy, however unreliable those figures may be acknowledged to be. And it is not clear that any of the new paradigms will contribute to that goal, either in fact or in registering the fact.
Above all, the alternatives are difficult to accept. They call for a shift in mind-set, creative thinking, non-stereotyped approaches, for initiative among field workers and supervisors who culturally in many cases have been socialised to follow rather than to lead, to implement rather than to plan. The training implications are large, reflecting the uncertain nature of adult learning programmes. Clear structures and printed texts reassure both practitioners and donor/funders. The challenge of new thinking in this area is very large, and those called upon to develop these new approaches need careful support.
These are some of the reasons it seems to us that the traditional paradigm of PL remains strong - a programme designed to assist a relatively small number of graduates from ILT classes to consolidate their newly acquired but yet tentative literacy skills, and to use these skills to move forward into diverse and more self-directed forms of development activities or further education and training. In practice, however, it is a programme which exists more on paper than in the field, which is contested and in large part ineffective, and which rarely achieves its goal of helping people in the towns and villages of developing countries to become fluent and comprehending independent readers and writers engaged in their own enhanced literacy practices.
Critiquing the traditional paradigm
We therefore set out here our own commentary on the traditional paradigm and what seem to us to be the growing pressures for change.
Discourses: Before we do this, however, we need to address the issue of discourse. As with ILT, there are in PL many rhetorical slogans. They are not always understood, and their implications are not fully followed through in practice. In particular, the so-called 'plight' of the 'illiterate' and the direct benefits of learning literacy skills are exaggerated in order to try to increase motivation for non-literate persons to join classes. And the value of single-injection modes of literacy learning underlies much of the discourse in which ILT and PL are couched - what we would call the 'If-you-study-this-primer-for-the-next-nine-months, you-won't-be-cheated' syndrome. Short-termism and simplistic linear progression rather than sustained assistance with varied literacy practices lie at the foundation of almost all ILT and PL programmes.
This is of course largely because ILT and especially PL form part of that development discourse which suggests that if the participants change, then society will be more developed - that if they learn literacy, then they will be less ignorant; that if they are less ignorant, they will make more socially concerned decisions; and that if they make more socially concerned decisions, the whole of society will benefit. This linear development discourse is of course not justified in practice (for example, when people learn literacy skills, they are not necessarily more knowledgeable), and it omits any mention of the need for structural changes in society as a whole for development to occur. But it remains very strong.
One area in which this discrepancy is most obvious lies in the language of participation. There is frequently a contradiction between the discourse which is used about participation and the practice on the ground which, despite the discourse, is often non-participatory.
We are aware, as we have indicated above, that the discourse of the providing agencies, the field workers and the participants frequently differ. The term 'post-literacy' for example forms part of the vocabulary of the funders and providers more than of the participants, except in those cases where the participants 'echo' the words of the providers in their conversations. Field workers and participants have frequently internalised the meanings of those at the top and repeat them, often with great conviction. Many of the cases of disillusion with the eventual outcomes of ILT and PL which can be found in most countries and which we have heard continually throughout our research arise from the failure of the discourse to reflect reality.
1. Planning and implementation: uncertainty and conflict:
In part, of course, this springs from the inherent problems which exist in adult literacy education. We have noted that there is among some literacy planners and providers (government, NGOs and even some CBOs) much uncertainty both about the aims and approaches of the literacy learning programmes. There is often an absence of clarity about goals, and about methodologies to achieve those goals. On the other hand, it is not always true that there is a lack of clarity; sometimes there are differing and strongly held views which may be expressed vehemently. Several literacy training agencies and practitioners (again among governments, NGOs and CBOs) are very clear about their goals and objectives and about the ways in which they hope to help the participant groups to achieve those goals and objectives, and they show considerable hostility to those who differ from them.
Some practitioners engaged in literacy learning programmes then are uncertain, while others are very certain but hostile to each other. Both groups share the same basic commitment to a uniform approach to literacy education. A third group however denies this: it holds the view that diversity is not undesirable. They argue that different approaches will suit different situations, that literacy learning will always mean different things to different people. For these agencies, any methodology which claims universal validity is suspect. This is not uncertainty, but a reaction against dogmatism.
In all of this, we are reminded of the "long-standing struggles over the purposes and control of education and basic literacy" which others have noted in literacy learning (Hamilton 1996 p142; see Gowen 1992; Street 1997).
These tensions reveal themselves particularly acutely in the field of post-literacy. There is no common agreement about what PL is. Indeed, PL (in some contexts at least) has become a battleground in which different approaches conflict with each other. The twin issues of uncertainty and conflict reveal themselves in PL in many ways (India 1998).
a) First, the purposes of PL are often debated and disputed:
i) Is PL primarily for literacy skill enhancement or for socio-economic development purposes? PL programmes swing hesitantly between being 'backward' looking (back to ILT activities with an emphasis on relatively narrow literacy skills learning) and 'forward' looking (looking ahead to employment or non-formal education or self-directed learning or (general or specific) developmental activities - to a wider social agenda). The tension which exists in ILT between literacy learning and social agendas becomes much more acute in PL. This is in part because of the growing independence of the participants, and in part because participants and agencies alike now seek to implement their literacy skills in a range of activities, both personal and developmental. But this tension is increased also because there are more agencies involved, both government and NGO, especially other Ministries with strong agendas of their own.ii) Is PL aimed at the promotion of individualism or groupism? Does the programme seek on the one hand to develop self-determined reading and/or self-directed individual projects, or is its aim on the other hand to promote collaborative community development projects? Is the immediate objective the personal growth of the individual members or group formation?
iii) Is PL intended to be conformist or transformational? Despite the rhetoric of most programmes, the main element in the large majority of PL programmes is to get messages across to which the participants must learn to adjust - for example, that all the participants should learn to wash their hands when they prepare food or adopt family planning methods or increase their productivity in specified ways etc. Although these PL programmes would call themselves 'transformative' through their messages, this is a very limited and directive form of transformation. In fact, the main aim is to assist the participants to conform to the norms of the rest of society. Only a few PL programmes in practice really set out to transform local society at the behest of the participants themselves.
iv) Again, PL programmes are divided between those which possess pre-set goals (determined by the providers) and those which seek to assist with learner-set goals. PL-providing agencies often feel uncomfortable without having some form of specified outcomes for their programmes (often in the form of accreditation schemes).
b) Secondly, the content of PL varies greatly, in accordance with the different goals and objectives set for the programme. Sometimes it consists of literacy skills learning activities, sometimes it does not include any literacy training. Sometimes it is much the same as CE, sometimes it is different from (perhaps leading to) CE. Sometimes it is broad and empowering, sometimes it is narrow and takes the form of specific training to achieve specific tasks. There is a lack of coherence about the PL programme.
c) Thirdly, the approach to PL is unclear. Many programmes feel a tension between on the one hand a universalist approach with directive curricula and centrally provided teaching-learning materials, a national and agreed programme in which all PL groups will be doing much the same thing, and, on the other hand, a diversified/localised approach (different income-generation activities, self-help groups taking their own decisions, and/or assistance with individual or local groups' agendas etc).
d) Fourthly, the emphasis on facilitated learning in many PL programmes on the one hand and the desire to promote self-directed learning which most PL programmes set before themselves as a major goal on the other hand create major problems for planners and those facilitators who are being used (facilitators are not universally used in PL as they are in ILT) and perhaps for participants as well.
All of these areas are confused or contested in PL. In large part, these debates (which in countries like India can cripple the effectiveness of PL) spring from the wider tension between central planning and large-scale programmes on the one hand, and the willingness on the other hand to tolerate and indeed encourage the diversity which local conditions call for. The Indian TLC has tried to tackle this issue of localisation of both ILT and especially PL, but with limited success. The Tanzania PL programme suggested "that in order to improve the quality of the post-literacy programmes the process of programme design should be decentralised at local levels. This would make the programmes more responsive to local needs" (Townsend Coles 1994 pp33-34); but the Ministry concerned is resisting such decentralisation (Sida 1998).
2. Participants: limited view of participant groups for PL
PL in most cases is aimed at a limited group. Most PL programmes are confined to ILT graduates or the group which has been labelled as 'neo-literates' (new readers etc). In practice, only a small minority of even that group is involved. ILT and PL programmes deal with progressively dwindling sectors of local society. Out of the large number of 'illiterates', some come to ILT classes, and a smaller number complete these courses; out of those who complete these classes, relatively few come to PL programmes. The rest (often the poorest of the poor) remain unaffected.
We recognise that increasingly PL programmes are seeking to reach out beyond this traditional 'target group'. Out-of-school youth and adolescent groups are being invited to participate, as are those who left primary school with limited educational skills. The new Kenya PL programme describes its 'beneficiaries' as "adults with basic education, participants in adult literacy programmes and classes, primary school drop-outs and out-of-school youths, participants in non-formal education and community leaders" (Thompson 1998). In one PL programme in Nepal, out of the required 15 participants to form the group, nine came from ILT classes; the remainder were drawn from primary or secondary school graduates and others who had taught themselves literacy skills (Robinson Pant 1997 p83). This last group is a newly recognised section of the literacy community: other surveys have revealed significant numbers of persons who have learned the skills which underlie their literacy practices without going to school or adult literacy class (Doronila 1996, Stromquist 1997, Pemagbi 1995 etc).
But this new recognition leads to another: that there is a wider call for assistance with their literacy from other members of the local community who cannot or will not, for many reasons, come to classes or activities. This call has not always been recognised by the literacy agencies, and ways have not often been found to help these. We recognise and support the great value which attending literacy groups brings with it to many people (benefits which are largely non-literacy, such as a sense of solidarity, increasing confidence, open discussion and debate, and an opportunity to get out of the house, to gossip and to learn about and contribute to community affairs etc), but we also point to the expectations and requests of those who do not join such classes or groups to help them where they are.
This widening of the 'target group' indicates that PL participants are very diversified. They are not homogenous, and therefore cannot all be taught the same things if they are to use their literacy skills in their own very varied lives. For example, 'women' as a category have very few common concerns: younger or unmarried women will have different concerns from those who have small children, and these again from those whose families may be grown up, and yet again these from those who are widowed; just as those women with outside occupations differ in their concerns from those who work mainly in the home (Rogers 1994 pp9-18). Those participants whose health is good will have very different interests and concerns from those who suffer ill-health. Those whose family members live close by will normally be less interested in letter writing than those whose family members are scattered far afield. As recent research has shown, fisherfolk differ in their interests (and literacy practices) from shoemakers, hill farmers from plains farmers, dairy farmers from rice growers and tea planters (Doronila 1996). And so we could go on.
We are very concerned about the tendency of literacy and other development agencies to put labels onto people. The term 'illiterate' brings with it many often unjustified connotations (ignorance, an inability to think or conceptualise or analyse etc), just as the term 'literate' brings with it triumphalist resonances (Bernardo 1998). Many of the participants have come to accept and use these labels and to bring with them similar expectations: a recent publication of material written by PL participants in Nigeria bears the triumphal title Now We Are Literate (Omolewa and Ouilette 1995). 'Neo-literate' is an artificial term devised by literacy agencies for their own purposes; it does not reflect any form of reality. We even have hesitations about the term 'participant' (although we use it here for want of a better term). Recent research shows that it too brings with it expectations of attitudinal and behavioural patterns which are imposed on those who come to classes. In some cases, it is likely that 'drop-outs' (another label) are caused by the decision of some people not to conform to the expected pattern of behaviour of a 'participant' rather than from lack of interest (Robinson-Pant 1997 p186). Behind all such labels lies a great variety of human beings, each with their different concerns and intentions.
3. Materials: limited view of materials
A third area of comment is that most programmes take a limited view of the 'materials' to be used in PL. The printed or written texts on which most PL programmes are based do not derive from the everyday activities in the neighbourhood but come from outside experts or from materials development workshops or (in the case of LGM) from special local activities which do not form part of everyday living. Indeed, the very term 'literacy materials' in PL contexts means 'printed or written texts which are devised for or can be used for learning literacy skills'. And the literacy skills they promote are of a limited kind, 'school-based literacy'.
The literacy skills which some PL programmes teach are taught in isolation from the real daily experiences of the participants. They are of course in many cases taught on the basis of an identified and typical (often idealised) daily life scene built up by 'needs analysis'. But all the evidence we have reviewed, with the constant complaints that primers and PL support materials are (despite needs surveys) 'irrelevant', shows that such PL programmes and materials do not match the existing literacy practices in which the participants are engaged or wish to be engaged, whether as a group or as individuals.
We therefore find in most PL programmes specially written texts, whether for learning together in a class or group (PL primers and support texts) or for individual reading in local libraries (supplementary readers, easy reading texts or follow-up 'materials'). We also find an increasing use of extension literature. Many of the texts found in the PL classes or libraries consist of books, booklets, posters and other materials such as comic books which extension agencies and others produce to get messages across to people in villages or urban communities - messages on health (especially AIDS), agricultural production, gender issues, civic duties, family planning, environmental issues or legal awareness etc.
This practice of using PL to get messages over to which the participants need to conform has its own dangers. For example, it may ignore the question of reading for pleasure. Increasingly, PL agencies are coming to recognise that many participants wish to read for pleasure, and they thus provide story books (especially based on local oral traditions).
|
One of many examples will illustrate this: ARED, a small NGO in Senegal, discovered that, contrary to what the development agencies and government institutions assumed, the adults in their area wanted to read not only about 'useful matters' but also 'for pleasure'. ARED addressed this demand (which did not come only from the well educated) by producing on a small scale fictional texts which they sold with some success (Bellagio 1995). |
But equally the desire to use reading materials for 'developmental purposes' may lead to a further danger. A number of PL agencies believe that these stories should contain a relevant social message, or at least that they must not contain negative images or undesirable attitudes. Thus certain kinds of texts found in the community at large are not felt to be acceptable. At least one major provider of PL materials in southern India informed us that they would
"not allow film magazines in our village libraries because of the damage they do because of their role models. Illiterates do not have role models except from the cinema. We want to create new role models through books etc. We do not encourage cinema songs. This was my personal decision. Of course we should be critical. We did experiment. We asked the people what they liked and they said 'stories' (especially myths) and relevant subjects. We studied the stories parents told to their children. But they gave the wrong signals because of the values they contained. Therefore we rewrote these stories and the people liked it. We pushed our own values" (India field notes, March 1998).
While this may be an extreme example of such control, it nevertheless represents an approach to PL materials which is widespread. Expressions of what it is desirable for people to read and write are often to be found, not least in the selection of the materials offered to the participants for them to choose to put into the local libraries. Only 'improving' literature (i.e. 'improving' in a developmental sense; for sometimes religious 'improving' literature is excluded from the texts provided to some women, Robinson-Pant corresp) is on offer. Film and sporting magazines rarely appear, although there is much evidence that this is the kind of material which many villagers and urban dwellers want to be able to read. The materials specifically produced for PL reflect the pre-occupations, values and ideologies of the donors and providers more than those of the participants.
The desire to ensure that the materials used in PL should be 'improving' leads to an under-valuing of other texts which are to be found in the communities from which the participants come. We have discussed this in the earlier report and we shall address it in more detail below, but here we would wish to indicate that there are in every community some found texts (sometimes called 'real materials') with which the participants will from time to time be called upon to engage. In addition, there are texts which already exist in other contexts and which could be 'fetched' into the community for particular purposes (Smith 1984, 1985). All these existing texts are regularly ignored in PL.
|
In a rural PL class, a visiting trainer, when informed by the facilitator that "there are no real materials in this village", pointed to an election poster on the wall behind the PL class. The facilitator dismissed this with the claim that "they can't read that". In fact, the group engaged with that poster most effectively as a group, discussing its meaning and purpose as well as its content, and recreating it in different formats during the succeeding hour, agreeing at the end that they had learned more from that experience than from an hour spent on the PL primer. Recent research in Bangladesh found that some literacy class participants were working out for themselves strategies to read and learn from material such as political posters; one woman had wall-papered her house with them and read them because of her interest in local politics (Maddox 1998). |
4. Literacy and learning
The main reason for this control over PL materials exercised by many providing agencies is that 'literacy' is seen more as a vehicle for 'further learning' than as a set of activities to be engaged in non-learning situations in every-day life. Most PL agencies make a close identification between literacy and learning/education: "post-literacy is part of a whole education plan" (Omolewa 1998 p6). They speak of adults who engage in ILT and PL programmes as 'starting' on their learning journey which they need to continue in lifelong learning. Lifelong learning is thought to start with literacy learning; the aim of literacy learning programmes is to bring about further learning. The emphasis is thus laid on the 'new' or 'potential uses' of literacy skills, learning new things, developing new literacy practices. While clearly this is an important part of literacy learning, it runs the risk of ignoring the 'existing uses' of literacy, undertaking more effectively those immediate tasks in the community which already exist. Many of the participants have come to talk about themselves in the same terms: 'we can now start to learn'. As one of our respondents put it, "PL is more learning-focused than learner-focused" (Robinson-Pant 1998a p7)
The greatest danger of this approach is that it fails to appreciate that learning takes place outwith literacy. The view that literacy starts the learning process not only leaves out of consideration all that learning which these same adults have been engaged in during the earlier (non-literate) parts of their lives. It also ignores all that social, community, family and reflexive learning without which none of us can survive. And it demeans this situated learning, suggesting that it is not important. 'Learning' in the sense used in most discourses about PL assumes that it is a linear process like formal schooling: 'if you learn this first, you can then progress to that; but if you do not learn this, you can never learn that'. And it is heavily value laden: 'this kind of learning is important; that kind of learning is not'. In a recent evaluation of a literacy programme in Brazil, the evaluator decried the fact that the women were engaged in reading fashion magazines and writing Christmas cards "rather than using their literacy for learning", as if the knowledge, skills and confidence these women were learning through the fashion magazines and greetings cards were not as important as the kinds of learning the evaluator felt they should have been engaged in (Stromquist 1997 p151). Such normative approaches to literacy and development may well form a hindrance to the motivation which the participants bring to their PL programmes.
This too accounts for the fact that most PL consists of reading rather than writing. In many cases, the aim of PL is thought to be for the participants to receive messages, not to create texts for themselves. There are some forms of participant writing. In Nepal, for example, PL participants are being encouraged to write a diary, an activity which most of them would never engage in for themselves. Here again, the 'improving' approach can lead to a gap between provider and participants. In another instance from Nepal, an NGO which set up its own printing press found the women in its programmes using it to print songs which they had written for themselves rather than the more improving material which the NGO intended (Robinson-Pant corresp). Elsewhere, writing in PL is seen as a special 'literacy' activity: the participants are asked to use write-on books very similar to those of school children, fill in gaps on pages in textbooks supplied to them from the outside, produce written exercises which the PL facilitator then 'marks' like a school test, write postcards which are given to them by the facilitator, or draft official or personal letters etc. Such activities are seen mainly as classroom (i.e. decontextualised) exercises in which literacy skills are being practised so that they might be reinforced. Writing for pleasure or for real uses rarely occurs.
5. Training: limited view of training for PL
We noted above that one of the concerns among many practitioners relates to the inadequate training of PL staff. In practice, many agencies appear to concentrate on training local persons to become simply literacy 'instructors' (although that term is usually denied). They are thought to have a limited role, confined to literacy learning, and therefore the training is limited to technical matters relating to how to teach literacy skills, sometimes with elements on additional materials production and income-generating activities.
In some cases, however, the facilitators are seen to be agents of change in a rather wider sense, and they have a training programme which brings in a range of developmental activities which they are urged to undertake within their own local communities. However, this focus on their roles as instructors and as change agent often means that they are rarely themselves seen as a beneficiary group. A fuller training of all those concerned with the provision of PL activities would pay great dividends in many different ways. Not only would a more effective and wider training programme with literacy facilitators and other practitioners make PL programmes more effective. Such training would become a development programme in its own right, treating the facilitators as participants in their own development programme.
A change of this kind can be made within existing resources. Where such training for PL does exist, the effects which this is having on the grassroots literacy teachers, on those involved in the local libraries and reading centres, and on the community leaders, are considerable (e.g. Training for Transformation 1984).
6. Monitoring and evaluation of PL
One of the major weaknesses of traditional PL lies in the field of monitoring and evaluation. There is a major tension here which it is not easy to resolve. On the one hand, governments and funding agencies call for clear outcomes and statistical evidence. PL is thus under pressure from funders and governments to produce the results (the reduction in the percentages of 'illiterates') which ILT only partially achieved. PL agencies therefore feel the need to use similar universal monitoring and evaluation methodologies as in ILT. And they want quick results which are not easy to achieve.
On the other hand, PL poses acutely a different problem. The question is how to measure use of literacy skills rather than levels of competences acquired. For example, since one of the outcomes of PL is intended to be independent learning, the results of the PL programme will be different for each of the participants. This will make these results very difficult to assess on a comparative basis. How, for instance, does one compare the different reading of booklets on vegetable growing and stories? How does one measure filling in a driving licence application form or a health card? And above all, how does one measure the 'sustainability' of these activities?
There are anthropological approaches to measuring changes in attitudes and practice, which can be converted into statistical data. A number of different qualitative approaches are being developed to counterbalance the more normal quantitative approach (e.g. Vulliamy 1990). We note some attempts to adapt these to ILT and to PL. Some experiments have been made in this area (for example, counting the increased number of signatures compared with thumbprints). In the ANTEP programme in the Philippines,
"Informal tools are used to evaluate the functionality and awareness components of the literacy training program. The design of the tools is made simple, non-threatening, informal, interesting and situation specific. Since learner evaluation involves measurement of change in the learner, the facilitator keeps a simple record that would help in knowing the progress in learning. The qualitative changes in the learners, because of their participation in the program, are assessed using in-depth interviews and the record of the facilitator" (Cruz 1998 p3).
But the difficulties of assessing the precise changes and the causes of these changes make this subject problematic. We understand the reason why PL agencies continue to use standard literacy tests for their evaluations. Nevertheless, the fact that different approaches to measuring literacy practices are not easy to use does not deny their validity; and training will be needed to the managers and supervisors in these techniques.
7. Failure to transfer
In our view, the fundamental weakness of most PL programmes is their failure to help the participants to transfer the learning which they have acquired in the classroom or literacy centre into daily use in their lives for their own purposes.
For many participants, 'literacy' is seen to be an activity which is undertaken in special centres, outside of their homes: "I am going out to literacy". It is thought to be a special value-laden activity imported into the village or urban area rather than a normal everyday activity taking place within the local community. The kind of literacy learned in such centres can be termed 'school-based literacy' as contrasted with the literacy practices which take place within the community, home or workplace.
We accept that it is much harder to develop a literacy practice than to teach a literacy skill. But we would argue that if literacy is taught as a decontextualised skill and not introduced as a practice, based on the existing practices of the participants, it will never find a useful place in people's lives.
The key question then is how to convert the literacy activities undertaken in the literacy centre, such as reading primer pages or writing primer exercises etc, into literacy practices at work, in the home and in the community, which may be headline reading, deciphering money or writing shorthand notes for oneself etc. Without such a transfer, the provision of literacy learning programmes will be a waste of time. Such transfer rarely appears among the objectives of PL programmes.
The problem is that all current PL activities are special activities, arranged to bring about learning of some kind. They do not relate to the existing literacy practices of the participants. We note the comment of one commentator on a specific PL activity in Africa:
"The idea of introducing an inter-village pen pal system [for PL participants] does not link in with the people's present use of reading and writing. Lack of social contact is not a common problem in the villages, and people mainly use their skills in a fairly pragmatic fashion, rarely writing for the pure pleasure of communication. It is difficult to envisage what kind of interest they could develop in writing to people they don't even know" (Fiedrich 1996 p9).
Such artificial activities, designed (as in a school classroom) to bring about learning goals, are unlikely to help the participants to transfer their new skills into daily use in their own specific lives.
We do not say this simply because of the question of the sustainability of literacy skills - although this is important. It would certainly seem to be true that literacy skills taught in isolation from real daily life, even if based on someone else's view of the participants' lifestyle, are in practice unsustainable without some support (which is why PL is seen to be so important to prevent 'relapse'). Rather we would argue this because such PL activities are outside activities, and the skills they will help to develop will remain in the sphere of an outside activity; their relationship to and use in the participants' own particular daily lives will be problematic.
And we say this because of our fundamental belief that, although some participants may seek to use their newly acquired literacy skills for non-literacy purposes (to gain promotion or to obtain some facility which is open only to 'literate persons', for example), in general it is not the learning of literacy skills which brings about economic and social development but the use of literacy skills in real situations using real texts to achieve their own goals which will bring whatever benefit literacy can bring to the participants and their communities. Unless they use their new skills to accomplish real tasks, there will be little benefit to the participants. Literacy skills on their own are not causal to development; they need individual and group decisions to employ them to achieve certain goals before they can make their most powerful contribution to life changes. The aim of all adult literacy teaching programmes, ILT, PL and ABE/CE programmes, is thus not the learning of literacy skills but the use of such skills, and it is by this that the success of all PL programmes needs to be judged.
There are, as we have seen, some signs that this traditional view of literacy is beginning to change. We have seen a number of innovative approaches to the teaching of literacy skills which suggest that there are other paradigms than one of linear growth from illiteracy to ILT to PL to CE to independent learners in a more or less formal learning programme which is isolated from or parallel to developmental activities.
Development before literacy: There are programmes which show clearly that literacy is not a pre-requisite for engaging in developmental activities. Development activities are often commenced by non-literate groups or by groups with a mixed range of literacy skills. The need to master literacy skills, when this arises during these programmes, arises primarily and most effectively from the particular developmental tasks and not from an externally introduced set of requirements. Literacy is only one of a number of different sets of skills and practices which such a group feels it needs to master in order to complete its chosen task, and in many cases it is not essential to the completion of that task.
The evidence we have received suggests that programmes of literacy teaching built on the assumption that the acquisition of literacy skills has to come first, and that these skills will subsequently be used for development, are less effective than those built on a 'literacy comes second' model. Adults learn literacy skills best when they feel that they need to engage in literacy practices for a particular purpose. Those who work on this model suggest that it is impossible to separate the learning of literacy skills from the purpose which the learners have set for themselves, and from the context of the communicative practices in which that literacy purpose is set.
Using literacy skills
This fundamental principle, which is derived from learning theory - that adults learn literacy skills best when learning for a purpose and that this purpose needs to be built into the learning programme - is reinforced by the view expressed earlier that the benefits of literacy, whether seen in terms of socio-economic development or in terms of personal growth in interests and confidence, only accrue when literacy skills are used.
We are not talking here about adults using their literacy skills in classroom exercises which facilitators set for their learners. Rather, we are talking about adults deciding for themselves why they need enhanced literacy skills and using these skills in their own 'real' contexts to accomplish a task which they have set for themselves. In so doing, they will work with the texts which are related to that task, either those which already exist or those which they create for the task. For example, the literacy tasks associated with a chicken-rearing project can form the basis for literacy skill learning through booklets on chicken rearing and through the records which the group will create for themselves. Literacy teaching cannot be divorced from the literacy practices which these skills are meant to fulfil.
For, as we have seen, the primary aim of all literacy teaching programmes, both ILT and PL, is not so much to encourage the learning of literacy skills as to encourage the use of literacy skills - partly to bring about socio-economic benefits and partly to help the participants to learn through using their skills rather than through a learning programme which is independent from the use. Learning literacy skills without using literacy skills is unproductive.
One implication of the view that the primary aim is to encourage the use of literacy skills to achieve real purposes is that literacy teaching programmes cannot be confined to those persons who are called 'illiterate', nor can PL programmes be confined to 'neo-literates'. In this model, literacy teaching programmes will be aimed at helping all members of the community to use their literacy skills, at whatever levels these may exist, for their own purposes, and in so doing they will develop those skills further through that use. We reject the deficit approach to literacy - that some adults can do very little because they lack literacy skills which they need to receive from some outside source. We reject the exclusion approach - that adults who cannot read and write are thereby excluded from the worth-while activities of their own local communities. Rather, we see all members of the local community (including the non-literate) as engaging with literacy practices and with found texts to the extent that they are able, using different strategies for this purpose (Bernardo 1998). The aim of literacy skills teaching is to assist all members of the community with their own literacy practices at their own request.
Different groups will set for themselves different literacy tasks. And the fact that there are different uses of literacy means that different approaches to literacy teaching need to be developed. The concept of sequential stages which is implied in the term 'post-literacy', even when seen within a continuum, is no longer acceptable. The idea of a PL programme aimed at a limited group of literacy learners and based on a limited range of specially prepared PL materials needs to be rejected.
A new definition: Instead of PL being seen as a stage following on from initial adult literacy classes, a more appropriate definition might be the provision of assistance to all those who feel that they are having difficulties with the practice of literacy in real situations.
This is a much wider concept than the traditional approach which reaches a small clientele and has a relatively limited range of activities offered by a small range of literacy agencies. PL includes all those forms of assistance with literacy use which literacy and other agencies can provide to all those who feel that they need assistance - those who feel that their experience and confidence of reading and writing and written calculation are too limited for them to be able to use all or some of the texts they find in their own socio-cultural setting or to complete their own tasks within the context of their own lives and achieve their own goals, those who feel they need to develop their literacy skills further.
It follows that such support, to be most effective, will need to be provided at the time and point of use rather than only in special classes or reading centres, and by other helpers as well as by literacy practitioners. This wider definition of PL seeks to promote more effective literacy practices in the community, not just more effective teaching-learning programmes.
Individuals and groups: Such assistance will best be offered to those who need it where they are, whether they are on their own or in some form of existing task-oriented group. Sometimes this may be a literacy class or discussion group; but PL cannot be confined to such centres. Rather than seeking how best to motivate people to join PL activities or debating whether PL exists in order to develop independent learners or group formation, PL in the new paradigm would seek to respond to requests for assistance with literacy practices from wherever they arise - whether from individuals, families, groups or whole communities.
And this assistance will continue up to the point which the participants ask for, up to the level which they feel they need to complete their immediate task. Individual or group forms of PL assistance will stop when the participants conclude that they have reached the point where they no longer need assistance, not when the literacy providing agency feels that a required level of achievement has been reached.
And these tasks will be of many different kinds and at many different levels. Adult motivations need to be taken seriously in all forms of PL. Those who want a teacher and those who only wish to learn to sign their names need to be catered for, just as much as those who want help with the literacy tasks involved in running a credit and savings group or a social action group, or more individual requests relating to the filling in of a passport application or the writing of a note to the schoolteacher.
Participants in PL
It follows that PL provision should extend, not simply to the graduates from ILT classes and out-of-school youth, but to all others who seek help in developing further their literacy competencies in different contexts. The need for some form of continuing assistance for people in both rural and urban communities to encourage and help them to practise literacy in real situations has been identified in almost every country, both developing and industrialised. There are growing numbers of adults in every society who have attended part or all of primary school or an adult literacy programme and who therefore possess a limited range of basic skills, but who are now outside of the formal and non-formal systems of education. There are those who, we have seen, have learned their elementary literacy skills 'on the job' without attending either primary school or adult literacy classes. There are in every country immigrants who find themselves illiterate within their new context. All of these are increasingly being called upon to practise literacy for real, and they will often need assistance with this activity, individually or in their own groups.
The 'target group' for PL then is very wide and very diverse. And the literacy situations which face them are many and are socio-culturally dependent, even group dependent. Thus the support provided will need to be context-dependent. General PL classes using PL primer texts or specially prepared PL reading materials which are intended to be used in many different environments may not be the most appropriate way to help adults with their literacy tasks in the community, and they should certainly not be the only form of PL programme. The provision of community-based facilities and services are likely to be more effective and longer lasting than PL classes and similar activities.
Assisting literacy tasks
One implication of this approach, then, is that the promotion of more effective literacy practices in the community will best be achieved not so much through classes or groups using specially designed PL materials in a specified set of PL activities as through a range of assistance provided both inside and outside of special PL centres (classes or libraries), using the ordinary printed and written texts which are found in the real situation or which are created during the activities themselves. The 'materials' used for this programme of assistance will be the 'real' materials arising from the particular tasks in which the participants are engaged rather than specially prepared 'learning materials'.
Post-literacy then will consist of activities designed to help people with their literacy tasks rather than the preparation and distribution of special PL materials. It is possible to envisage what such a programme might look like, although how far it can be fully implemented remains to be tested. PL assistance to a wide range of possible participants who feel that they need help can be provided in a number of ways:
a) by assisting those who will never go to classes: The main strand of such a programme would be the provision of assistance to those who, for a variety of reasons, do not and never will go to literacy classes. The objective of PL in this situation is not to try to encourage and motivate these people to go to the literacy centres, to learn literacy formally through a specially prepared learning text. Rather, PL practitioners will seek to assist people in the community, individually or in groups, with their literacy practices, in much the same way that extension staff help people with their farming or health practices or with community development activities. There is of course no literacy extension service; but like the extension staff, a PL programme can make provision for helping people in their homes, at their places of work, or in their community interactions - in other words, on-the-spot assistance with their existing literacy tasks, rather than trying to persuade them to leave these locations and to come into a special 'learning location' to learn new practices. We note the existence in most villages and towns of focal points where several kinds of literacy activities are taking place (for example, hospitals, shops, post offices, police stations, local council or community centre etc). It is at these focal points that some forms of assistance can best be provided.
b) by promoting the transfer of newly learned literacy skills out of the literacy learning centre into the community: A second possible strand in such an approach would be to help all those who are going to ILT and PL centres to find ways in which the literacy skills they are developing can be taken out from the learning centre into their everyday lives. The transference of literacy skills from the context and discourse of the classroom into the context and discourse of the home or work or the community is not easy. Moving from learning to implementing needs assistance. It is part of the task of literacy facilitators to encourage and help the participants to use their new skills in their daily lives for their own purposes. The literacy learners will at the same time strengthen and extend their skills through that use. The implications of this for the role of the facilitators and the training programmes provided for them need to be worked out (see page 91 below)
c) by working with producers of real texts: A third possible element in a PL programme designed to help people to 'do their own literacies' more effectively is to work with those who are producing the texts which are to be found in rural and urban communities in developing countries.
One part of this strand would be the adaptation of these texts to the needs of those persons who have limited literacy skills and confidence. There is widespread evidence that even very experienced persons sometimes feel that they 'cannot cope' with some forms of texts - insurance or legal documents, for example, or some religious texts etc. The normal approach of those who produce this material is that the users need to adapt themselves to the texts rather than the texts be adapted to the users. Part of a PL programme aimed at developing more effective uses of literacy skills in the community might be directed towards helping the producers of texts for the community - whether they are NGOs, government agencies, or commercial publishers - to adapt their materials so that they are more available to a wider audience. This might involve helping to rewrite them in simpler language or in a different register, or to redesign them so that they become more accessible. Providing feedback to the producers on how these texts are being used, and what impact they are having, would be a major service to the producers.
|
We note one example from the BRAC adult literacy programme in Bangladesh, where a group of women at their own request tried to engage with the marriage registration form, only to find that the print was too small and the words used too difficult. The supervisor of this programme is now encouraging the group to rewrite the form in simpler words and larger print size and will assist them to engage with the local officials to make their protest known (Bangladesh field notes 1998). |
A second part of this strand might be to help with the dissemination of these texts into areas where they are more rarely found. Building up a literacy environment at the community hall, church or temple or mosque, at the school or primary health centre, at the youth centre etc has long been a goal of many literacy teaching programmes. The provision of outlets for government forms such as passport applications or driving licence forms etc would also be part of this service. Translating some of the found texts into different languages would also be useful (for example, in many countries, official notices are often in national languages or even in English rather than in the local tongue).
A third element in this strand would be the mediation of these texts; for there is considerable evidence that at each stage of further learning some form of mediation is an effective way of helping adult literacy learners to make progress - to build up their confidence, to engage with a text to discover its meaning within its context, to help to relate the new material or format of text to their own experience and to develop into new potentialities for new uses of literacy. One major element of this which has been demonstrated is the development of critical approaches to found texts: the questioning of the socio-cultural and power relationships which lie behind all texts, whether these are 'literacy learning' texts or 'real' texts. The development of critical language awareness is needed if people are not to be bound into their existing literacy practices but are to emerge into new potentialities to use their enhanced skills for their own purposes (Fairclough 1992).
There will of course be other ways in which a PL programme aimed at helping people with limited skills and confidence to engage with their literacy practices in the community more effectively can be created. We do not set out this programme outline as one which should be followed. Rather, we would encourage all kinds of agencies to experiment with forms of literacy assistance appropriate to their own situation, to reflect on these programmes, and to disseminate their experiences to others within their own region.
Materials for PL
We have described above the various ways in which special texts are being produced in many different formats and at many different levels specifically for the participants in PL programmes. We have also noted the existence and importance of large amounts of extension texts, especially in health and agriculture, many of which are now being used in PL programmes. Not all of this material is in a format appropriate to persons whose literacy skills are limited and whose confidence to read such texts is weak. But these are matters which can be remedied through a mediation process with such materials. And we have noticed the willingness of many extension agencies to revise the format and even the contents of their materials, with the assistance of experienced literacy workers, so that they may reach a wider audience (including those with limited literacy skills and confidence) more effectively and more interactively.
Found and fetched texts: But beyond that, we would wish to draw attention to the range of texts which already exist and which can be found in every local community or can be brought into the local community, not just in urban contexts but also in rural environments. These have been called on occasion 'ordinary' materials (to distinguish them from the 'special' texts designed and used for literacy skill learning such as primers and 'follow up materials', 'easy readers' and LGM etc) or 'authentic materials'. These are texts in the social environment, produced by various bodies to fulfil various communicative and other functions. Some are commercial in origin, aimed at providing news (e.g. newspapers or magazines) or meeting interests or giving pleasure (e.g. reading books) or providing useful items (e.g. notebooks). Some are sales information (e.g. mail order catalogues as in South Africa) or advertisements (e.g. cinema notices as in India). Into this category fall the various materials produced by government - for example, driving licence forms or ration cards. Banks, police stations, hospitals, post offices and other bodies issue notices and forms etc which often reach into the rural as well as the urban communities. Religious and political groups produce large amounts of written and printed materials, and in many countries, local residents are not backwards in creating graffiti. Some are solely for 'fun' (e.g. T-shirts).
It is impossible to list all that is available even in our case studies (and this will vary for every local community), but the evidence which exists is that the amount of such found texts is very substantial. Surveys of such material have been made for communities in Bangladesh, Ghana, Sierra Leone and Nigeria (Pemagbi 1995; Omolewa 1997), and it is clear that the range of these materials is very wide indeed, from number plates and slogans on vehicles to signs in front of schools, from calendars to school textbooks. Each of these texts forms the centre of a set of literacy practices.
Created texts: We also need to note that most development activities will themselves develop new literacy practices and with them, new 'real' literacy materials, such as PRA materials, accounts for women's groups, minutes of group meetings, record sheets of attendance or of loans, etc. The materials which development agency and community groups create can become the basis for further literacy skill enhancement. The move from community analysis (by PRA or other methods) to community management in which the community takes control of the implementation of their own development projects will call for new texts to be used and created.
Using found texts for learning literacy skills: Since the aim of literacy teaching, especially at PL, is to help local people with their local literacy practices, it follows that the texts to be used for this assistance will need to be the texts found in their own locality. Not all of these texts are in a form appropriate to persons with limited literacy experience and confidence. Nevertheless, they form part of the literacy material with which these persons engage in their daily lives. Assistance with the use of this material, suitably adapted and mediated to meet the needs of these people, would, we argue, be the most effective way of developing usable and sustainable literacy and numeracy skills within a particular context.
But the link between these 'real materials' and the literacy needs of the people is very rarely made. We found no development agency using any of their instruction leaflets or extension publications to enhance the literacy skills of their participant groups (although a number of agencies do give some attention to the level of literacy skills of their users when preparing these materials). Most of those who produce or promote the distribution of these texts (extension and 'real' materials) assume that those who receive them need no assistance in order to use them.
Some of these materials are of course used in a context of interaction, in which direct and immediate help with the interpretation and use of the texts can be and sometimes is given. But there is a good deal, such as technical leaflets, which is printed and issued without any steps being taken to ensure it reaches the right hands or is interpreted accurately by those who read it. Like newspapers, these texts are distributed freely, to be used in any way which those who receive them choose - which on occasion may not be for literacy practices (for example, newspapers are often used for wrapping things up or for padding etc). Books and booklets are circulated generally throughout the community. Brochures and leaflets and notices and tracts are passed from hand to hand or sent to groups without any attempt being made to ensure that they are adequately discussed. These real materials are seen as independent materials, and those who use them are deemed to be independent users. The effect that this has on the confidence of the early literacy practitioner can be imagined - many will find that they cannot cope with such texts and may therefore be deterred from trying again with other texts they may come across. The importance of mediation of these materials with literacy users outside of the classroom is clear.
At the same time, very few literacy agencies use these found texts, even when they are available, in their ILT or PL classes, although extension texts form a key element in the material supplied to many of the PL libraries. But even in these library centres, these texts are rarely mediated to the new readers. Discussions are sometimes held round certain books and booklets, but since these are rarely supplied in large enough numbers for all the participants to have read them before the discussion, the effectiveness of this form of mediation is doubtful.
It is however important that these real materials (found texts) should not simply be regarded as alternatives to the literacy primers, to be identified and brought into the literacy classes by the facilitators and used by them to help the participants to learn literacy skills. Access to texts is not enough; it is the engagement with the texts which will bring about change. Talking of the Tanzanian village libraries, one report has pointed out that
"such an approach to post-literacy is doomed for failure since it operates on the assumption that mere access to the written word inspires and transforms the lives of people. But literacy is not an autonomous tool with the power to act on people. Literacy for the sake of literacy is not only fruitless, it is impossible. To direct a pen or decipher a letter involves the mastering of a technical skill, but any meaning derived from this activity stems from elsewhere, namely from the context in which literacy is practised and by which it is shaped" (Fiedrich 1996 p8).
Literacy is not simply decoding words; it is an active search for meaning through engaging with the text in its context.
Such engagement will only take place effectively with adults if the texts are found and selected by the participants rather than identified by the facilitator and imposed on the literacy learners. In practice, of course, it may be necessary for the facilitator to introduce these newer approaches by bringing in examples of such materials. But in the end, to be participatory in adult literacy classes, the participants will need to choose what they want to read and write and make meaningful.
Assessing found texts for literacy teaching: Nevertheless, even when they have been found and chosen by the participants, they still need to be used for the purposes of learning through use. It is clear that some will need to be simplified and adapted for use with the class members.
All these found texts are at the centre of literacy practices - they are intended to be used in some way or other in the community. Any learning which is undertaken through these texts needs to be built on these literacy practices, on the way these texts are used in what has been called their 'domain' (Gee 1990; Barton 1994; Barton and Hamilton 1998). It is not appropriate to decontextualise them and to use them simply as classroom texts. It is better to talk about bringing literacy tasks from the community into the learning situation rather than bringing literacy texts which can so easily become similar to the PL primers, teaching-learning materials which the facilitators control.
The use of this kind of material for the practice of literacy teaching raises a major issue. These materials cannot easily be assessed in terms of their usefulness for promoting literacy skills, nor is it clear how they may be adapted to the needs of the new literacy practitioners. Judging them by criteria imported from the formal school system such as the vocabulary used, the length of sentences or the complexity of ideas, which have been used in some cases, is now felt to be inappropriate to adult learning programmes. Even at school level, 'levels of readability' have to a large extent been discredited and replaced with more careful gradings of 'learner difficulty'. But 'learner difficulty' is a problematic concept to implement, because it will vary with different learner groups or even individuals. It is clear, for example, that lack of experience will be a greater barrier than the vocabulary used (Moon 1993). Readers cope with the words and sentences and concepts in these found texts more easily when they relate closely to their own experience. A text which may appear to be very difficult to one reader may be easy to another because of the different experiences which they bring to the reading. This is of course already well known among those who prepare special PL materials; farmers for example cope more easily with farming-related materials than with fishing-related materials. The same is true of 'real materials': universal assessments of appropriateness cannot be made with found texts. The key element here is that users of found texts do not just read them; they engage with them. And different users will engage with texts in different ways according to their differing experiences and purposes.
This is also true of vocabularies (Rao 1996b; Jennings 1984). Modern understandings of adult learning indicate that adults do not normally learn in a linear progression from simple words to more complex words (except perhaps in the sense in which the concept of 'more complex words' is used in those languages where the script is built up with complex forms of letters). Indeed, 'simple' words like 'there' and 'their' without any context in which to locate their use are frequently found to be more confusing than a sentence with a mix of simple and complicated words.
The more normal progression for adults is to move from the concrete which lies within their own experience to more abstract ideas built from these concrete experiences. Adult learners cope effectively with elaborate vocabularies and concepts if these are felt to be immediately relevant to them, as for example in carpentry or tailoring or in relation to well known films. Some simplification of language is however sometimes necessary. Industrialised countries have appreciated this for many of their texts such as government forms, insurance certificates, legal documents etc. The Plain English Campaign is an example of this. Some adaptation in layout in terms of the size of print and line length will also often need to be made. Most people read newspaper headlines more easily than the smaller text underneath. Devices designed to help readers to cope with difficult or complicated texts such as headlines, sub-headings, key words etc will make this material more accessible to a wider range of readers. This is a field calling for practical experimental studies into the best ways to assist with the adaptation of these found texts to the needs of those who have limited literacy skills.
Surveys of local literacies: If the main aim of PL is to help those who "cannot perform the literacy-related tasks needed to function fully at home, at work, and in civic life" with their own literacy tasks, using the texts related to those tasks (Benton 1996 p95), it follows that the first requirement for the preparation of all PL programmes is to find out what those tasks are and what those texts are. This of course does not need to be elaborate 'research', although in some cases this would be highly desirable. Rather it will mean that planners, supervisors and particularly facilitators need to acquaint themselves with the different literacy tasks which the participants already do and those which they may wish to perform. The use of PRA techniques could help with this, identifying who does what kind of literacy activities with whom on what occasions, using what kinds of texts for this purpose. We would suggest that, as well as surveying what kind of real materials are or could be made available within any community, these investigations should concentrate on literacy tasks and literacy practices - in other words, how these texts are constructed and used and how they are regarded in the community.
It is important that this subject of 'research' should not deter literacy practitioners. We are not referring so much to outsider, top-down, expert and usually individualised research. Rather we would emphasise the development of local knowledge from the bottom up through participative and collective investigations into literacy use and perceptions. Clearly there is a place for external and academic researches (Hodge 1997), although these will be limited in number, and their use to draw broad generalisations may need to be examined carefully. But that is not what we would urge here. Rather we are talking about the multitude of surveys of local literacy practices and the found texts already available in any community which some facilitators already do and which all need to do at their own level in order to help their participants to complete these tasks for their own purposes. This is not reinventing the wheel. It is building a firm foundation for each and every literacy class.
What is more, it is important that the participants themselves should discuss and debate, discover and deconstruct the literacy practices and texts which are all around them (see below page 97 for examples). The need to build on the use of real literacy tasks a critical element is the distinguishing element in a transformative literacy learning programme rather than a conformist one. Freire's 'conscientization' through investigation applies to the community and classroom literacies of any local group as well as to other forms of social action.
Relations between the new PL and ILT:
Many literacy agencies speak of PL materials as 'over-lapping' with primer literacy in terms of language level and subject matter. Although PL activities are designed to follow on after the end of ILT, the specially produced materials are often carefully prepared to "go back to below the level" achieved at the end of the initial course so as to "bring them [the participants] back to the level they were once at" and to provide reinforcement to learning (SRC Madras).
This approach to PL is however based upon the assumption that a literacy learner needs to learn in a specially sequenced order. But as we have seen, modem understandings of learning, especially as applied to adults, based on considerable research, indicate that the division between learning first and practising afterwards, even with such an overlap, is not always helpful (Rogers 1996; Brookfield 1986). Adult learning is best undertaken by 'doing for real' irrespective of the 'level'.
We do not therefore see PL as following after ILT. Rather we would argue that PL activities in the form of assisting with the use of literacy skills in real situations should overlap with instructional activities right from the start of the ILT programme. The practice of literacy, based on the real literacy tasks which the participants wish to engage in, should increase progressively as the learning of literacy skills develops.
In place of a sequential model of primer literacy teaching followed by a PL programme, we have already proposed (ODA 1994) that the overlap should be as follows:
Rather than acquiring technical skills first and applying them later, this approach involves the participants learning through practising, increasingly using real materials in class as apprentice readers or writers with gradually diminishing support from the facilitator-instructor. In this way, the practice of literacy will be sustainable after the end of programme, for the participants will have learned to engage more and more with the found texts in their own environment and to create texts to meet their own needs in different situations.
We know that many literacy agencies do not believe that adult 'illiterates' are capable of using real materials while they are learning the basics of literacy skills. But we would reiterate our view that these adults are already engaging with the found texts in the community; and the examples we have given show that adults learn best when they engage actively with materials chosen by themselves and with which they wish to engage, rather than with materials chosen by the facilitator or literacy providing agencies - and when they apply their learning immediately rather after a delay.
Role of the facilitator: Such an approach - that PL is about assisting literacy learners to develop their own literacy practices using relevant tasks identified by the participants - has important implications for the role of the traditional literacy facilitator. The role of the facilitator as teacher, someone who controls the learning, follows the primer, selects the activities and instructs the learners on what they are to learn, will be reduced. The role of the PL facilitator will now be to discover with the participants their existing literacy practices, to explore with them the ways in which they want to develop their literacy skills, to encourage the participants to identify the kinds of tasks they want to fulfil, to provide structured opportunities and a supportive environment for the participants to engage with the texts they have identified, and of course to monitor and evaluate the progress of the participants. This kind of role of facilitator will be new to most people's experience of education, both from the point of view of being a teacher or being taught, and will require considerable training and support to develop and maintain the required attitudes and skills.
Training for PL: It has been urged that the facilitators in literacy training programmes are not capable of engaging in such a new role. This points to the weakness, not of the facilitators but of the training programmes and support systems for PL. The weakness of the resource base for PL affects the training of PL facilitators more than most other areas of PL activities.
The implication of this approach then is the need for more and different forms of training of literacy practitioners to help them to develop the range of skills and attitudes needed to help the participants to engage in their own literacy tasks, using the texts appropriate to those tasks as the basis of learning, and to help the facilitators to see their literacy teaching in a wider context, not simply of developing literacy skills but also of encouraging the participants to engage with texts through critical language awareness.
There have been a number of examples of training programmes with middle level management (supervisors) and with facilitators which show that it is possible for such training to be both effective and motivating (Rogers 1999b); and the establishment of the Real (or New) Literacies Forum in Bangladesh shows that commitment to these approaches can also be built (Education for Development 1997-8). The obstacles come mainly from established systems and interests rather than from the facilitators and supervisors.
Relations between PL and Continuing Education (CE):
As we have seen above, a distinction is sometimes drawn between 'post-literacy' and what is often called 'continuing education'. Some have argued that CE is that part of PL activities which is more or less directly related to the formal education system - either in terms of covering the same curriculum as primary or secondary school or of assisting those participants who wish to gain entry into the formal system at an appropriate point. The kind of help advocated here for those who need assistance with their reading and writing and numeracy will include for some persons help with learning things which they would have learned in primary school or the building up of formal learning skills which will be required if they were to enter (or re-enter) school. But for others, continuing education will not be relevant, not their goal. For them, the uses of literacy will mean more informal help with writing letters, filling in forms, responding to state and other formal documents (e.g. health cards), etc. A fully developed PL programme will seek to provide informal help to these people on a specific task basis without recourse to schooling or formal educational provision.
A Post-Literacy Service:
It follows that PL as at present designed in most countries is unlikely to reach all those who need such assistance, or to provide the range of literacy formats needed by diverse participant groups and individuals. What is needed is increased provision for guidance and counselling for those with limited reading and writing skills outside of PL centres, to help them to deal more effectively with the real literacies which they encounter or need in their personal situation. A post-literacy service is, we believe, needed if PL is to provide appropriate forms of help where and when they are most needed.
The form this service will take will of course vary greatly from country to country. Nevertheless, we can make some suggestions about the general shape its work might take. Apart from the basic function of providing direct assistance to those with limited literacy experience and confidence, it might well include some or all of the following:
· training literacy practitioners in the identification and mediation of existing real texts· bridging the gap between the producers of real materials and the users, working with the producers of these texts to adapt them to the needs of those with literacy difficulties and disseminating them more widely
· supporting local groups in the development of new literacy agendas and in experimental projects designed to test new approaches
· training other professionals such as agricultural and health workers to assist the participants in their programmes with their literacy activities
· researching into local literacy practices and perceptions with different groups and localities
· helping local groups in monitoring and evaluating the use of these new approaches
Building an infra-structure: Such a 'service' cannot however be left simply to become an agenda for literacy providing agencies to provide. It will need some institutional framework. We have seen above that there are those who feel that one of the weaknesses of the current approach to PL in some countries is that it lacks an institutional framework which would give it the basis from which it can not only become sustainable but can also develop and grow. The creation of such a framework - which we believe would be better built on the consolidation, systematisation and institutionalisation of current community literacy resources such as community letter readers and writers rather than on a more or less formal system of special learning centres - will be a major concern of those responsible for PL seen as using literacy practices rather than learning literacy techniques.
We wish to make clear that this kind of PL programme does not rely for its implementation on outside (Northern) expertise or on donor funding. All it calls for is a change of approach on behalf of the existing PL-providing agencies using existing resources - seeking to promote literacy practices, helping the participants and others to complete their own literacy tasks, making links with other producers of texts.
Nevertheless, should donors wish to support PL in different country contexts, we would suggest that resourcing this framework and the service programme which it will promote,
· using and building on existing literacy practices and the found texts related to these practices,· adapting and mediating real materials as necessary to the different needs of those who have some, but relatively limited, literacy experience and confidence
- this will be the key element in an effective PL aid programme.
Ivory Coast reading during work
We are conscious that the approaches advocated here (and proposed in our earlier report) are not without their problems; and we would wish to face these as far as we are able to identify them. We list here some of the issues which we have experienced and which others have raised with us in the implementation of a number of initiatives based on these pre-suppositions. They are not listed here in any order of priority.
Lack of availability of 'real materials': It has been asserted that there are not many 'real literacy materials' in some areas, especially rural areas. We would agree that the distribution of found texts is very variable.
On the other hand, we feel that such a verdict - that there no or very few found texts in the social environment which are useful for literacy learning - is not solidly founded. First, the decision as to what is, and what is not, valuable reflects the value systems of the researchers. It is not securely based in ethnographic research methodologies. Secondly, it seeks once again to detach 'real literacy materials' from their context, to treat found texts as learning materials. Perhaps a better question to ask is, are there any existing or potential literacy tasks in the immediate environment, for which 'materials' can be found in, 'fetched' into or created for the immediate situation in order to respond to the participants' real and expressed interests? And to get a truer answer to that question, it will be necessary to ask the participants (perhaps through PRA) rather than to survey the situation from the outside.
Nevertheless, we agree that in some contexts, especially in some regions of minority languages, there are few real literacy materials. And in a number of areas, there may be little or no first language literacy texts. The choice arises in such a situation as to whether to introduce material which has little contextual relevance and important power implications in that it further marginalises the less written language of the community (this can often be done quickly and cheaply), or whether to help the community to embark on the long, arduous and often costly (but always fascinating) process of developing material in their own language and mapping out their own literacy interests. Although decisions relating to this will inevitably vary from context to context, the desires and intentions of the local community members will always be an important factor in that decision. Thus in some communities, the participants may express their desire to read materials which exist in other languages (religious books like the Bible or the Koran, for example; or fashion magazines in the national language etc), and such requests should always be taken seriously.
In all such cases, texts will have to be created or else be brought into the community from outside. It can therefore be argued that in certain cases it may be necessary to start the literacy teaching programme with post-literacy, building up the literacy environment before launching an initial literacy teaching programme.
However, where there are no 'real literacy tasks' to be performed, no materials which the people can use except the literacy learning texts brought into the community by the literacy teaching agencies, and if the community has no interests which potentially would involve writing or reading texts of some kind (e.g. Doronila 1996 pp37-40), then we would question the purpose of an initial literacy teaching programme. While we recognise that there will always be those who wish to learn literacy skills for symbolic reasons or to achieve some non-literacy goal such as promotion rather than to use their newly acquired skills, we would question whether there is much point in offering assistance to people to develop their literacy skills in situations where there is no chance for the participants to use those skills and therefore no chance of them gaining any benefits from literacy. The criteria for judging whether to start a development programme in any community by the provision of a literacy teaching programme must consist of the existence of opportunities to use literacy skills, not the opportunities for the people to learn literacy skills. We would suggest that it will be preferable to start with the particular goal which the group wants to achieve, and if literacy tasks are involved and literacy skills are needed for them to meet that goal, then literacy support can be given where and when they need it.
Failure to bring about transformation: It has been suggested that this 'real literacy tasks' approach may not lead to any significant change in the socio-political structures, that the use of found texts may in fact reinforce existing inequalities within the community, that the concentration on the existing uses of literacy more than on the new uses of literacy will not encourage 'development'.
We accept that there may be some truth in this, depending on how the programme is implemented. But we must point out two things.
a) Starting where they are: First, there is growing consensus among those involved in education and training programmes with adults in a wide range of areas (especially vocational training) that the main goals of such programmes are twofold: first, to help the participants to do better, more professionally, what they are already engaged in, and then secondly, to help the participants to move on to new kinds of activities. The kind of PL programmes we are proposing are aimed first at helping the participants to engage with their existing literacy practices more effectively, gaining confidence through this enhancement of their literacy skills and experience. After that, the participants can decide for themselves whether they wish to move forward, to engage in transformational activities, and in what direction that transformation will proceed. We do not believe that any PL programme should seek to dictate transformational change; nor do we expect such a programme to avoid it because the participants are unaware of the options. Rather, we expect that PL programmes will create an environment through which the participant groups can become more knowledgeable about options, and more autonomous, confident and venturesome in their decision-making. We would argue that in many cases transformation should be promoted by the participants, not by the outside agencies; and that it should be in the direction and go as far as the participants wish, not be pre-determined by the literacy providing agencies. We feel it is in many circumstances more appropriate to wait until the participants themselves propose change and the direction in which that change should go rather than for this to come from the agencies, facilitators or the literature available to them.
This is an important point which deserves fuller treatment than we can give it here. The process of negotiating any project activity (including literacy learning) with local groups is one fraught with difficulties. We have noted above the absence of evidence of bottom-up PL programmes, learning programmes in which the goals are set by the literacy learners. This may be because such programmes do not leave much evidence; but equally it may reflect the problems surrounding such a process. It is much easier to develop PL programmes where the goals have already been set by governments, donor agencies or NGO change agents rather than to develop programmes based on goals set by the participants. In particular, there will often be the need to build up the confidence of the participants before they will be able to articulate their intentions and aspirations. Building such confidence through helping the participants to develop further their existing literacy practices would seem to be preferable to embarking immediately on new literacy tasks which may well appear to be daunting. The ultimate goal is a literacy project in which the goals of both participants and providers become shared on equal terms.
b) Developing critical literacy: Secondly, one or two experimental projects have demonstrated clearly that it is possible to help the participants to engage critically with the existing found texts, using their own experience of literacy. We can give three examples.
|
a) During a training workshop in Ghana, the sign written on many walls in the town (in English) 'Don't urinate here' was taken for analysis. It was discussed in depth. Who wrote it? Who was it intended for? Why was it in English and not in the local language(s)? Why was it in a 'high' form of language rather than in a 'low' form of the language if it was meant for the poorer people? The participants wrote several different variations of the text and debated their relative merits. The debate centred round this found text raised many issues relating to power structures and processes in that community. b) In Nigeria, another group made a survey of shop signs in a market. This again raised many questions. Who were they for? Why did so many include extreme words such as 'Glorious' (the Glorious Drug Store) or 'Supreme' (the Supreme Butchers)? Which ones were in local languages, and why were so few shop signs in those languages (most were in English)? How did the written language of these signs relate to the spoken languages in the market (many of the traders who had English signs could not speak English)? Why were some in small scripts and others very large? Why did some include the names (and even the addresses) of the stall-holders? c) A third example comes from Botswana where a collection of materials collected from a Coca Cola shop (including two ties, a hat and a plastic cup, all bearing words) gave rise to an extended debate about imported commerce, culture and value systems. |
We would argue that there is nothing inherently in any of these found texts which will lead to the reinforcement of inequalities. It will depend on how the facilitator uses them in the learning group, how the participants engage with these texts. It is not a matter of decoding the words or learning literacy skills from these texts: it is a matter of the participants engaging with these texts in their own ways. As we noted above, the development of critical language awareness (Fairclough 1992) through found texts should be a key element of any ILT and PL programme. For example, we note that one aim of most PL programmes is to encourage the participants to read local newspapers; the development of critical approaches to newspaper reporting would form a key component of a PL programme aimed at transforming society. The aim is not just to support existing practices but if necessary to change them as the participants wish.
There is a further implication of this: that the participants can in certain suitable contexts be encouraged to engage critically with the literacy primer - for that too is a found text, devised for a certain set of literacy practices. Hill and Parry have pointed to the necessity that the participants should "not treat the text (i.e. primer) as object but as action" (Hill and Parry 1994 p18). Some literacy teaching agencies will find such a proposal threatening. It would however be very valuable if a discussion of the nature of the teaching-learning materials were to be included in the training programme for literacy facilitators and instructors, for they often have to try to answer questions about the primer raised by the participants. "Language sensitivity training" would be a valuable addition to the training of PL facilitators. This of course raises major issues which need to be debated in literacy circles.
However, we agree that there is a place within any PL programme for the providing agency (largely through the facilitator) suggesting new opportunities for community development, widening the debate beyond the found texts. As we have suggested above, we do not see the change agent in PL as simply being a self-effacing facilitator but a person with an agenda and (literacy) resources of his/her own, to be shared with the participants. PL - like all forms of adult education - will best consist of two-way learning, 'learning on equal terms', with all the parties treating the others as adult equals (Rogers 1992 pp239-240).
We would raise here a comment that this 'real literacies approach' might itself reinforce gender disparities in literacy practices; or that it will help only with women's practical needs, increasing their efficiency rather than addressing some of the systemic gender (and other racial, or ethnic or religious) inequalities. Again, this depends on how the issues are raised. We see the literacy practices as the key issue here, for any discussion of and changes in literacy practices will always involve discussion of and changes in power within the community.
We would also raise here the danger of using real literacy materials (found and fetched texts) simply as teaching-learning materials, an alternative primer, with their words being decontextualised and therefore stripped of any meaning. One of our correspondents from Africa wrote: "When I pointed out to some of the teachers I spoke with that some of the posters on the walls in the classrooms could be used as materials, they expressed their inability to meaningfully exploit these" (Ihebuzor 1995 p6). The key word here is 'meaningfully'. As we have noted above, reading is the search for meaning in written texts, not just decoding words. The use of real materials will call for discussion of the context of those texts, not just the use of individual words for learning reading skills. For we are always (even with a primer) dealing with situated literacies. Words are used differently according to their particular setting, and understanding that use is part of literacy learning.
Too difficult: A third group of criticisms which has been raised is that this procedure (helping the participants to learn from and especially to engage critically with these found texts) is too difficult for the facilitators to perform.
We accept this in some cases - but this is a failure of the providing agencies, not of the facilitators (Rogers 1989). Many of the facilitators for PL are not adequately trained or supported. It can be argued that a prior development programme needs to be undertaken with this group, to help them to examine their own literacy practices, to help them to develop critical language awareness in relation to the found texts which they themselves use. Unless the facilitators are encouraged and helped to become aware of their own literacy practices, they are unlikely to be able to help others to grow in literacy skills and confidence. It would be of clear advantage if the pre-service and in-service training and the support systems of adult literacy facilitators were to be taken as seriously as the training and support of agricultural and health extension workers, although of course the resource base for adult literacy is not as strong as for these other services. This will mean changing the training and support systems substantially; the existing systems are inadequate. Some action research here might demonstrate how far the effectiveness of literacy teaching programmes depends on the careful selection and training of the facilitators.
Again, some feel that such materials are too difficult for the participants to engage with. But this is precisely the point: if the participants have chosen the literacy tasks they wish to undertake, then the work of the facilitator is to help them to engage with those tasks and the materials needed for them. We believe that many literacy agencies under-estimate the literacy learners: "the radical point that most programmes cannot cope with is that local people can know and make choices over their learning" (Maddox 1998).
Other criticisms and queries have been raised: for example, that some of the participants may not feel able to identify any 'real materials' for themselves, and may not wish to read 'real literacy materials' identified by the facilitator. There are many recorded instances of the participants preferring a textbook to the more informal kinds of learning materials. Some feel more at home within a literacy classroom with something which looks like a textbook, something which has been written by an expert specially for them as literacy learners, something which comes into the community from outside.
We agree that this is an issue which arises regularly in some contexts. We note the case of a participant in a Botswana literacy class who openly said he did not wish to read or write anything after the class but simply to get the certificate at the end of the course so that he could obtain a driving licence. This is why we have tried to insist that the texts used in this kind of learning programme should be those used in literacy tasks which the participants themselves have selected, texts with which they wish to engage. It may help if we were to get away from the idea of 'texts' (real or otherwise) which need to be 'read' as objects, and concentrate instead on literacy 'tasks' which the participants wish to perform. If that task is one of formally learning literacy skills (as in the Botswana case), then a textbook primer may be an appropriate form of text to use for this task. We would however point to what has been said above about the value of analysing the primers as 'texts-in-action' rather than decontextualising them.
This suggests an answer to another comment: that the participants in literacy classes will soon become bored with 'real material'. Again we agree - if these materials are decontextualised and treated like classroom texts. And we would also point to many clear signs of the same literacy learners being bored with primers. But we are not suggesting that the facilitators should use real materials as alternative primers. Rather, we feel that they need to seek to help persons with those specific literacy tasks which they have chosen, so that they learn in an adult education way, through doing for real.
There is perhaps a greater danger that such a PL programme may be taken over by persons or groups within the local community who are already relatively well educated and who wish to use the help available to advance their own careers or businesses since they can see literacy as useful to themselves; that this approach may advantage some at the expense of others (particularly the very poor). We see this as a significant issue for all PL programmes, one which needs to be addressed throughout such a programme. For it confirms the key argument of this report - that literacy practices are always an issue of power; and that any literacy teaching programme will inevitably alter the power structure and systems in any community. And we would point out that the very poor too have literacy tasks which they wish to accomplish, often of a very different nature from those of the more middle classes. A PL programme would need to attempt to help these people with their own tasks.
Again, it has been suggested that the new approach does not take seriously enough the agencies' desires and the government's need for statistics. It is argued that it takes the different desires of the participants too seriously, that it does not maintain a balance between the various stakeholders in the programme.
We have examined above the issue of the evaluation of PL programmes under the new model. Here we accept that, at the moment, this approach is unlikely to yield firm statistical evidence of the reduction of the percentages of illiterates. However, the anthropological approach that real literacies practices involve can be matched to the variety of established anthropological ways of reporting, including systematised self-reporting. Pilot projects are needed on the various ways of generating reports of the use of literacy skills in real situations, developing from these generalised statements, and extrapolating from them statistical data. A programme of induction for agencies to help them to convert these statistics into data which they can use for international comparisons will be needed. It is possible (although not easy) to develop ways of measuring progress with literacy which does not depend on standardised educational tests.
Further, there is the argument that even with this approach of using literacy, there will still be the need for teaching literacy skills. The implication of this is that a literacy training programme will need to be incorporated inside this proposed new kind of programme.
While we agree that teaching of literacy skills is necessary, we would wish to insist that this should not consist of a traditional teaching programme brought over as a whole and inserted into a programme designed to encourage the use of literacy skills. It is not possible simply to 'drag' the old model over and 'drop it into' the new model. For this will mean that the learning programme will be largely unchanged - and therefore as ineffective as it has been in the past in promoting the use of literacy skills. Nor can we simply drop the new model into or append it onto the end of the old model. That too will not work.
We would suggest that to speak of 'teaching' is perhaps not the most helpful language to use in this context. We would prefer to talk about 'helping people with their literacy practices' rather than 'teaching them some subject (knowledge or skill)'. We would wish to see PL (and indeed ILT) as 'targeted assistance and advice' with literacy tasks.
But even if the language of teaching is so strong that it is necessary for any programme to use it in their planning and implementation, we would point out that we have argued throughout this report that literacy learning with adults should always be located within a context of using texts which the literacy learners have themselves chosen. If it is to be true to adult learning principles and not simply follow educational dogma, it will be situated learning working with situated texts.
This means that any formal teaching-learning programme needs to be set within a wider programme of the development of communicative practices, helping the participants to learn through different literacy practices at different times, rather than be compartmentalised into one block within the larger programme. And because it will be based on the use of literacy skills rather than on the learning of literacy skills, it will include a variety of literacy and language skills - journalistic, commercial, legal, religious, etc, all within real contexts and designed to fulfil and learn from real literacy tasks chosen by the participants rather than the literacy teacher. The training implications of this again need to be examined in detail.
Finally, we are aware of the danger that such a programme may become normative, that it may be singly prescriptive. We have watched other initially innovative programmes being implemented mechanically; we have noted the criticisms made by many evaluators that in many so-called Freirean approaches to literacy teaching, the rhetoric may be used while the traditional model continues to be applied (Archer and Costello 1990). We do not see this model of PL (and ILT) as being a new kind of universal truth. Rather, we see a new set of approaches based on new understandings; we see these approaches as growing, developing; we see local programmes being built on the basis of these principles, and as the experiences of the effectiveness of these approaches emerge, we see the basic principles themselves as being open to further adaptation and elaboration. It is not that we are not convinced of the validity of the conclusions we have drawn from these basic principles. Rather it is that we see all literacy (and therefore all literacy learning) as situated in particular contexts. We recognise that people are different, even within the existing literacy classes, with very different literacy experiences, expectations and intentions, just as those within the local communities are different and often in contention, one with another (see especially Doronila 1996; Bernardo 1998). We suggest that the main task of all those who devise ILT and PL programmes is to develop helpful learning assistance to different individuals and groups appropriate to their own circumstances. We expect the donors and funders and supporters of such programmes to be concerned for the local variety rather than the commonality of literacy learning programmes.
A national programme?: And this raises the issue as to whether it is possible to build a nationally valid PL programme on the basis of the micro-literacies approaches we have been advocating, to scale up while retaining sensitivity to local literacies (Street 1997; Robinson-Pant 1997 p126).
We propose that this is possible, even within existing resources. The funding and support of local literacy activities provided by many different government and NGO agencies, and based on locally determined demands in a variety of contexts (women's groups, work-based locations, religious groupings, health programmes, farming or fishing co-operatives, trade unions, community centres, local government bodies etc) and following nationally agreed guidelines, would create a diversified but nevertheless a national literacy programme.
The development of such guidelines is a matter which needs to be agreed in each country. But some common features can be outlined. We would suggest that there are no generally applicable methodologies, because the literacies and the needs and interests of adult students are too diverse. Nevertheless, there are some general approaches, attitudes and principles which could be applied to all adult literacy programmes. These are not theoretical but very practical: for example,
· that literacy learning programmes put into the context of existing projects/programmes/activities (provided they use the materials of these activities) are likely to be more effective than literacy on its own (i.e. 'literacy comes second' rather than 'literacy comes first'). This is not the same as literacy classes having a 'functional element'. Rather, it is encouraging the natural process of learning literacy skills during existing developmental projects rather than starting new projects· that there is no use in trying to motivate adults to learn to read and write; instead we can offer help to adults with their own literacy tasks where they are and when they need it through a variety of activities.
· that the aim of all literacy activities in a national programme is to encourage the use of literacy skills outside the classroom, so that every literacy class should try to find ways of assisting the class members to transfer the newly acquired skills into the community on a daily basis
· that homogenous groups of non-literates all learning from the same materials are probably less effective than mixed groups of literates and non-literates, enabling peer learning and sharing
· that to ask an adult group formed to learn to read and write to be the same group which keeps chickens may be unreasonable; a chicken-rearing group may need to be very different from an adult literacy class
· that all literacy classes (not just programmes) should begin by exploring what reading and writing activities the specific group wants to do and help them to do those tasks - not generalised needs assessments but particularised and contextualised.
The core of all adult education is to help adults to learn what they want to learn when they want to learn it and in their own way and for their own purpose. Many existing national literacy campaigns set out to persuade adults to abandon their adulthood and to learn what they don't want to learn (the 'how-do-I-motivate-my-learners?' syndrome). But a national literacy programme and even a campaign can be built by offering support to agencies (government or NGO) to provide locally responsive literacy help programmes using local literacy materials. For years, many countries have supported locally determined adult learning programmes in other developmental sectors. It may be possible to build a national literacy programme on the same basis, by offering national support to locally determined activities. Of course, the key to success is (here as elsewhere) the selection of appropriate persons and their training and support to become facilitators/animators using adult education methods.
CONCLUSION
The views expressed in this report have been developed over a lengthy period of time through an extensive review of the literature and consultation with leading practitioners in the field and through a number of visits made to case studies over a period of four years. They have been elaborated in the course of two sets of research team debates. The view has been expressed to us by several of those who work in the field that the traditional 'literacy first' approach has been expensive, largely ineffective in developing usable literacy skills, and - even where the initial response has been positive - rarely sustainable in the longer term.
The review conducted in the earlier report and in this follow-up report has given some positive evidence of the potential of an approach to learning literacy skills through undertaking real literacy tasks within real settings to create a cost-effective programme, using the found, fetched and created texts within the local community rather than specially prepared post-literacy materials, to achieve greater, more relevant and more lasting results - using adult learning rather than school-based approaches. What is still needed is a number of trials to be conducted in different contexts on the basis of the approach outlined in this report, and the evaluations of these trials to be made available on a comparative basis so that it can be tested and if useful extended more widely.
4.1. Implications for donors and implementing agencies
4.2. A possible research agenda
4.3. Action plan
We would draw the following policy implications from the above discussions:
Terminology: Although we do not like the term 'post-literacy' because it emphasises a staged approach to literacy learning which we find inappropriate for adult learning, we recognise that the language of PL is likely to remain. We would urge that donors and aid agencies should always enquire as to the exact parameters of the PL programme as planned and particularly the objectives it seeks to achieve; and with that, the ways in which these achievements can be measured.
Support for PL materials: The main finding of this report is that support for the practice of literacy in real situations using the real texts associated with these practices is likely to be more effective than support for further literacy instruction using special 'post-literacy' materials. Therefore, we do not feel that there is normally a case to be made for the funding of the preparation and production of further standardised PL learning materials, since these, used on their own, do not always promote the use of literacy skills in real situations to complete literacy tasks.
Where such specially prepared PL texts are supported, we would suggest three things:
a) that the general needs of participants in PL programmes are probably best served through the production of regular magazines which can meet many of the very varied interests of such a wide target group;b) that the production of specific texts should be carefully targeted at particular groups, and that strategies should be developed for ensuring that these texts reach and are mediated to these groups rather than that they be distributed wholesale to local libraries for the 'general reading public'; and
c) that (on educational grounds) special support might be provided to PL projects where the literacy learners are themselves included as active participants in the writing and production processes of these materials (LGM) rather than having the materials prepared by experts, even when there is a major process of field testing. Donors need however to be aware that such projects are unlikely to be sustainable for long, although their learning value will be high.
Discovering local literacies: We believe that it is essential that action research be conducted into the practice of literacy in different circumstances and into the best ways of promoting the use of literacy skills to achieve participant-determined objectives. We have set out below a possible research agenda. In addition, we would urge that experimental programmes should be funded and then reviewed, and that the lessons (both positive and negative) gained from these should be widely disseminated through meetings and publications.
Real literacy tasks in ILT and PL: In particular, we would urge funders and planners to encourage the use within the initial literacy teaching programmes of real literacy tasks chosen by the participants rather than by the planners or facilitators, and built upon the found and created texts (real materials) needed for these tasks. Again, we believe this will encourage the transfer of literacy practices from the classroom into daily life. The active involvement of the participants in the planning and evaluation of the PL programmes is likely to increase their commitment and enthusiasm. In addition, this will encourage the development of potential uses of literacy skills.
Measuring literacy practices: Support for the search for new ways to create measurable indicators which can register the progress made with the use of literacy skills as opposed to the ability to pass a test at a given point in time should be provided in different locations, and their findings reviewed and compared.
Literacy support service: Funding and other kinds of support should be given to those organisations and projects which seek to provide a literacy support service - for example, through the appointment and support of 'literacy support personnel' and literacy resource centres such as 'drop-in centres' as well as centres which might more appropriately be called 'community learning centres' (CLCs) rather than 'continuing education centres' (CECs), a title which might limit their activities to 'educational' programmes.
Infrastructure: Concern should be felt for the kind of infrastructure which will support such localised activities. The development of a locally appropriate institutional framework might form a suitable project to support in some circumstances. Without such an infrastructure, a PL programme is unlikely to be sustainable.
Training for PL: A key element must be the funding and support of training in the concepts and practices of post-literacy in different contexts. The effectiveness of what is done in PL will depend not only on the resources and the commitment of the practitioners but also on the clarity with which they understand the nature of the task. Planners, managers, supervisors as well as facilitators all need opportunities to develop their understandings, skills and attitudes in working in more flexible and creative ways with the participants. Without this training programme, much of the other support provided is likely to be wasted. A programme designed to test out whether increased training yields increased effectiveness in PL programmes would pay dividends.
Scale of support: Our approach to PL suggests that funding should be on an appropriate scale. We note the trend towards larger aid programmes over longer periods; but we would also suggest there is a place for the support of some projects which are localised and which do not lend themselves to scaling up. For we see all PL programmes as being based on situated literacies, so that PL-providing agencies should seek to localise their programmes. The building up of a national/regional network of contextualised learning and activities rather than a single standardised national programme may well be the key to the effective development of the use of literacy skills to bring about development. Nevertheless, the issue of scaling up does need to be addressed.
We do not see this report as having closed further debate on PL but as taking the discussions further. Such debate will however need to be based on firm foundations. The report has identified several areas where further research is needed so that the discussion can be more effective. This research should be in the form of action projects with careful evaluations and widely disseminated conclusions.
Local literacies: First, we need to know more about the actual literacy practices of different groups in different areas. The findings of the research of Professor Doronila and her team in different communities in the Philippines (Doronila 1996), of Prinsloo and his group in South Africa (Prinsloo and Breier 1996), of Rachel Hodge in Nepal (Hodge 1997), and of David Barton and his team in the UK (Barton and Hamilton 1998) have shown that such research is not only feasible but also very productive in terms of the identification of possible teaching-learning strategies and materials. We would also wish to include in this some research into the existing systems of literacy assistance such as 'community readers of letters' etc in which communities adopt strategies to deploy different literacy skills throughout the community.
Participant motivations: Again, we need to know more about the interests and intentions of the different groups of participants as against the perceptions of these interests (usually described as 'needs') which the providing agencies often put into their mouths. We have noted above the gap which sometimes exists between what the participants in PL want and what the providing agencies feel these participants want or need. The views of the participants and of the field workers need to be explored more fully. Some research into contrasting agendas would be valuable. We note that some participants in existing literacy learning programmes come for apparently symbolic reasons (wanting to become 'educated') and others for more instrumental reasons; and there is some evidence that those who come for symbolic reasons may drop out more often and earlier than the others. But this needs to be researched thoroughly.
Adapting real materials: Some experimental programmes on different ways of adapting real materials (especially extension texts) and monitoring their use with different groups would yield fruit which could be used widely in many different arenas and countries.
Literacy-based income-generation activities: The effectiveness of the income-generation activities which often complement adult literacy programmes at both ILT and PL stages has never been reviewed. Education for Development began such a survey (Rogers 1994), but this whole area needs to be researched in more detail.
Measurable indicators: Action research into the application of tried ethnographic approaches to qualitative evaluation to adult literacy, especially the development of new ways to measure progress in literacy practices, and how these can be converted into relevant and appropriate statistical evidence for government and international purposes needs to be conducted in several different areas.
Value of and issues relating to the use of ICT for adult literacy: The implications of ICT for adult literacy teaching should form a major area of investigation, both its usefulness in helping adults to learn literacy skills and its effect on literacy practices. Experiments with different ways of using ICT should be conducted in a variety of contexts, and the conclusions reviewed. One area of direct investigation is using such approaches with those who are unemployed or under-employed in developing new skills which will help them into new forms of employment.
Other areas of possible research can be identified as follows:
Language teaching, including dual language teaching, needs to be reviewed in different contexts and key lessons drawn from this for local literacies.Numeracy teaching is a largely under-studied area in developing country contexts. Action research using ethnographic approaches would yield valuable information for policy decisions.
Accreditation in relation to PL needs to be surveyed in the light of the desires and needs of the participants and the opportunities before them to use such certificates meaningfully.
The training of facilitators is an area where action research is urgently needed, if ILT and PL programmes are to become more effective.
We would wish to stress that this list is no more than an indicative list. The absence of any research project from this list should not be taken as implying that it might not be valuable.
The research team sees this report as the basis for immediate action as follows:
· We would wish to see an international consultation taking place (outside of the UK, if possible) in which the views of those working directly in the field of PL in developing countries about the major themes of this report can be expanded. It is important that this report should itself be tested and used to build yet further understandings of PL and further programmes of PL activities.· We would suggest that a meeting with donors should be held, at which their attitudes towards the support to be given to PL seen as the promotion of literacy use rather than the promotion of further literacy learning should be explored. We would see this as a separate event from the international consultation of practitioners, in which case it should come very soon after the international consultation.
· We suggest that support should be given to two or three southern agencies (government or NGO) for them to conduct pilot projects in this new approach to PL and the training programmes which will be needed for them to be effective. Among the countries in which agencies have expressed interest are Bangladesh, Botswana, Ghana, India, Jamaica, Kenya, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, South Africa and Tanzania; and regionally ASPBAE has indicated in a regional conference in Dhaka in August 1998 its keenness to engage in such innovatory activities. These would be projects run by local bodies on their own or in association with northern supporting agencies rather than projects run directly by northern agencies. The selection of the projects should come out of the international consultation.
