Reviewed are five programs (textbooks, audiovisual materials, workbooks, video-cassettes) designed to improve academic survival skills in secondary students. Content emphasis, reading level, rationale, objectives, organization, instructional method, student evaluation, physical features, and recommendations are listed for each. (KC)

Analyzes, within the historical context of functional literacy, a Connecticut Department of Education policy paper linking adult basic education and work force development. Calls for broader basic education that links instrumental knowledge with autobiographical insight and meaningful sociocultural knowledge using collaborative methodology. (SK)

Discusses issues related to the movement toward minimum competency in secondary education. Addresses the problem of defining minimum competency and the dangers of imposed standardization. Identifies three conceptualizations of minimum competency as: (1) the narrowly educational standpoint, (2) the concern with functional literacy, and (3) a more…

The basis for all computer-assisted instruction at the Continuing Education Learning Center at Jackson State University is the instructional techniques necessary for the success of at-risk adult learners who find traditional methods inadequate. Each learner is pretested for reading level for placement, and skill assessments are made to diagnose…

Teaching English as a second language (ESL) to competencies requires that the instructional focus be on functional competencies and life-coping skills while developing the spoken and/or written English structures necessary to perform these skills. A step-by-step approach to develop and implement a competency-based approach to ESL for adults is…

The Adult Performance Level (APL) Competency-Based High School Diploma (CBHSD) Program in Texas is briefly described. The program was developed as a flexible and effective alternative to a conventional high school diploma program and to the General Educational Development (GED) test. Program goals are expressed as competency outcomes which are…

This report reviews major components of a workshop to develop consensus on a variety of issues and to increase participant awareness of innovative approaches to competency-based adult education (CBAE). The 200 workshop participants included state directors of adult education, other state staff, university personnel, local project directors, and…

The articles in this issue include "Let's Talk about What This Means" (Duncan); "Dyslexia and Adult Literacy--Forging the Missing Link" (Kidder); "Competency-Based ESL, One Step Forward or Two Steps Back?" (Auerbach); " A Comparative Look at Adult Literacy Programs in Stockholm, London, and Boston" (Nickse);…

A model workplace literacy program is described that was designed to upgrade the basic skills of adult workers and developed by El Paso Community College in partnership with J&J Register Company, a Texas division of Philips Industries with approximately 300 workers. Pre-assessment results indicated that about 95 percent of the workers had…

This workbook accompanies an interactive videodisc used in the Working Smart workplace literacy project prepared for the hotel and food services industry in the Los Angeles, California area. The first instructional unit addresses preparing the work area, including stocking supplies and cleaning the work area. The second instructional unit covers…

This document consists of performance, computational, and communication modules used by the Working Smart workplace literacy project, a project conducted for the hotel and food industry in the Los Angeles area by a public school district and several profit and nonprofit companies. Literacy instruction was merged with job requirements of the…

The conference papers included in this collection address issues of concern to literacy development in the community college. "Functional Literacy and Persistence in the Community College," by Dorothy M. Knoell, raises questions about student persistence in the absence of requisite skills. "Training Perspective on Functional…

About half the states in the U.S., either by legislative or administrative action, have moved toward the imposition of statewide performance standards in their elementary and secondary schools. Typically these standards pertain to the basic skills--reading, mathematical computation, and written and oral expression. Almost all of these programs…

This document, which is intended for workplace trainers, contains materials for conducting five workplace mathematics courses that were developed through the Workplace Training Project, a partnership involving Lane Community College in Oregon and five area businesses. The five courses, which were developed by project staff based on the business…

This booklet provides descriptions of 16 adult education programs that have been validated as successful by the Joint Dissemination Review Panel (JDRP), U.S. Department of Education and that are being promoted by the National Diffusion Network (NDN). Although the programs were developed by individual school districts in response to local needs,…