UPP - Date

Deb Wood congratulates Suping, an UPP student, at KL&S Celebration of Learning in June.

Althought tt was disappointing that no programs came forward to do the UPP curriculum, it has given us the opportunity to try a more direct approach to programs. I contacted a couple of early literacy/family literacy practitioners who work directly with LBS programs in their areas. Both had ideas as to which programs might be interested and contacted them with the additional information about the project I'd sent them. I'd hoped to hear back from the programs, one rural and one urban, about doing the UPP curriculum with parents in their program starting in October. I haven't heard back yet and I'm crossing my fingers that it might be due to holidays and so on. If I don't hear back soon, I'll beat the bushes again! ALSO in Ottawa and KL&S in Kingston are both on board and will start programming in the fall, after a recruitment drive for participants.

I'm meeting with Noriyeh (our research consultant) mid-September to talk about the research pilot - how it went, what seemed to work and what didn't and so on. We'll re-jig as necessary and put the plan in place as programs start up with the curriculum. Both Isobel and Deb Wood, instructors for the UPP curriculum last year, suggested that the students do the PDQ after a couple of weeks of computer orientation so that they feel comfortable with the technology.

Late June I met with UPP facilitators, Isobel Bisby (ALSO) and Deb Wood (KL&S). Both agreed that the curriculum package had lots of "meat" to it and said they hadn't had time to complete all the learning ideas and explore the learning resources with their students. To boost the prose and document reading aspect of the curriulum, it was suggested that the UPP instructors for the project be directed to add reading activities that emerge from the curriculum and best suit the particular student or group needs. I will also create a blog or wiki (haven't decided which) so that instructors can share their experiences and their ideas with each other on a weekly basis.

I hope your summer was good. Get ready - September is here!

Deb

I'm back!

I loved the Pysanka at Vegreville Alberta!

Hi folks,

We got back from our 10,303 kms drive out west and super holiday last Wednesday. We had a wonderful time seeing this fantastic country, taking part in the Centre for Family Literacy's "Cultivating Connections" conference in Edmonton and visiting with friends and family. Now I look forward to the fall plans for the Building Family Literacy and Essential Skills OLES project.

I mentioned in my last blog that by the second week in June I'd posted the call for proposals to provide UPP in an LBS program on our website, that I'd sent it out to Ontario literacy networks to forward to their region's LBS programs and had posted it in the CLO e-bulletin which goes to all community based literacy programs.

The proposals were due July 16. I did not receive one proposal nor did I have any inquiries. At the conference Lorri mentioned that she had forwarded the call to a program in her region that she thought might be interested but I didn't hear from them. What do you think we should do? Our intention was to start the UPP programs in October.

I'm thinking that there may be a few issues:

• The children's program or childcare is not a program that LBS programs normally sustain. For most LBS programs this probably seems like a difficult aspect of this project to take on, especially if they have not made partnerships with childcare programs in the community before this.


• Most Ontario LBS programs focus on essential skills for the workplace and do not see family literacy programming as a fit for their participants.


• Ontario Works recipients do not need to attend school or to look for work until their children have entered the school system and so, are not likely to join an upgrading program so participant recruitment might be seen as a possible difficulty.
  

I met with Isobel and Deb Wood, facilitators of the UPP program at ALSO and KL&S respectively, to talk about the UPP program, how it worked for them and ideas for the future.

I received the final PDQs and questionniares from ALSO and KL&S too. I'll connect with Noriyeh soon to talk with her about the results and the best ways to move forward. Noriyeh was away for June and July.

We (Dave and I) took hundreds of photos! I might add a few to the blog now and again.

For more info about the Pysanka:

http://www.vegreville.com/sub.asp?MainID=55&SubID=106

Hope all is well!

Deb