June Volunteer Hours: 312 |
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School Year to Date: 7048 |
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Hello and happy summer from Literacy Source! Summer classes are in full swing, and we continue to grow in both size and scope, serving 210 students this summer, and offering some new electives like our Walk in the Park and Watercolor classes. As you know, we don't aim to grow exponentially, we focus rather on serving our students well with our fantastic, dedicated team of staff, volunteers, and supporters.
Speaking of serving our students well, we wouldn't be able to do that without YOU. Right now we have 135 active volunteers, which includes 53 Tutors, 40 Conversation Partners, 15 Class Assistants and 20 Board and Committee members. You allow us to offer our students exactly what they need to gain the skills and education they need to create new opportunities for themselves, their families, and the community, and for that, we are so grateful.
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In community,
Liz Wurster
Communications Coordinator
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"Disability doesn’t make you exceptional, but questioning
what you think you know about it does."
~Stella Young
July is Disability Pride Month, and we thought to share with you this insightful TED Talk by Stella Young, a journalist and comedian, who also happens to have a disability. Stella has an affable way of telling hard truths in an irreverent manner, but the points she makes are powerful. For example, she highlights how the inspirational posters and advertisements you might see championing individuals with disabilities are often guilty of "objectifying disabled people for the benefit of nondisabled people.The purpose of these images is to inspire you, to motivate you, so that we can look at them and think, "Well, however bad my life is, it could be worse. I could be that person."
Stella doesn't buy it. She likes the body she's in, and while she understands that folks who stop her on the street to tell her she's inspirational might mean well, they're not acknowledging her for her contributions, but rather "for managing to get up in the morning and remember my own name."
It's easy to see some of the parallels between the plight of our students, especially when Stella highlights that she subscribes to the social model of disability, "which tells us that we are more disabled by the society that we live in than by our bodies and our diagnoses." Our students do face challenges that can make life more difficult, and that is why our partnership with them is so important. However, these challenges are not because of an inherent weakness our students have, but rather an expectation our society sometimes has that they assimilate or conform to our way of life, rather than learning and growing from the unique perspective they can offer.
Although Stella passed away not long after this TED talk, her insight is a timeless reminder of the importance of continuing to reexamine our perspective.
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Start With Your Student’s Strengths
Have you thought about how to build on your student’s strengths to facilitate their learning of new or difficult content? This teaching tip is ideal for one-on-one learning, and can also work in a classroom setting where students are grouped based on similar language skills.
As you get to know your student, you can increasingly personalize your lessons with them. Maybe your student has excellent conversational skills and a large oral vocabulary, but they find reading or writing to be a challenge. Or, maybe you have a student that communicates more easily by text but struggles to maintain a conversation. You can add your knowledge of your student’s strength to your teaching toolkit to help your student gain confidence and learn difficult things in a more accessible way.
Read the full teaching tip here.
By Megan Dalton, ESOL Instructor
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Congratulations - and thank you! - to the following volunteers for reaching a year of service with Literacy Source!
- Ann Bing (Board Member)
- Jeff Wells (Board Member)
- Jenny Du (ESOL Class Assistant)
- Leah Clark (Conversation Class Facilitator)
- Paulo Sy (Board Member)
- Soh-Leng Culhane (ESOL Class Assistant)
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Some great Literacy Minnesota free webinars are coming up. Please note: you will need to create a Literacy Minnesota login if you don't have one already.
Working with Literacy and Beginning level ESL Learners
Racial Equity 101
Understanding the Somali People: History, Culture and Migration to Minnesota
Teaching Intermediate Alphabetics
Solidarity Not Charity: Challenging the White Savior Complex in Adult Education
Teaching Reading Vocabulary Remotely or In Person
Phonics in Adult ESL: Recommendations, Activities and Resources
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There were five new citizens since our last newsletter, hailing from Ethiopia, Pakistan and the Philippines. Congratulations!
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Staff: Cory Ihrig Goldhaber
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Tacoma author Sasha taqʷšəblu LaPointe presents her memoir, Red Paint: The Ancestral Autobiography of a Coast Salish Punk (available in paperback). LaPointe was the winner of the 2023 Pacific Northwest Book Award. Extra copies are available at the Lake Forest Park, Shoreline, and Richmond Beach Libraries. You can sustain our author series by purchasing a copy of Red Paintwhich will be 20% off in our stores during the months of June and July.
Saturday, July 29, 10:00am – 7:00pm (Forest Park, 802 E. Mukilteo Blvd, Everett, FREE)
Activities include; children's activities, fashion show, live music & entertainment, free raffle giveaways, open mic contest, food & vendors, networking & fellowship, honoring our elders and high school graduates! For info, call 425-583-7736 or visit www.scbhcwa.org.
Colson Whitehead with Robert Sindelar
Friday, July 28, 7:30pm (The Great Hall, Town Hall Seattle, $35)
The second in a trilogy that began with the successful Harlem Shuffle, Crook Manifesto blends dark elements with humor to feature the gritty realities in New York City’s complex history. From Blaxploitation films, America’s Bicentennial Celebrations, and the Jackson Five, Whitehead shows popular culture as it was five decades ago, to high crime rates, social unrest, swelling racial tension, and anti-police sentiment that seem to mirror life today. The novel is an unembellished exploration of harsh truths. Yet in between the corruption, theft, violence, and a motley crew of hustlers and hitmen is Whitehead’s perhaps unexpected exploration into the meaning of family, adding greater depth to the narrative.
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AmeriCorps: We are Hiring!
Please help us spread the word. We are hiring 2 full-time positions, starting in September 2023.
Please contact Caroline for more details.
Other positions:
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Our next New Volunteer Orientation (via Zoom) will be on August 2 at either 1pm or 7pm.
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Summer Classes are in session and run until Sept 7 (Summer Class Schedule). Office Open for all Classes and Tutoring. M – Th 8:30am – 3pm.
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Miss any of our past volunteer newsletters? You can access archived newsletters at the bottom of the Volunteer Resources of our webpage.
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Literacy Source acknowledges that we are on the unceded ancestral land of the Coast Salish people, the land which touches the shared waters of all tribes and bands within the Suquamish, Tulalip, Duwamish and Muckleshoot nations. Indigenous people are still here and continue to honor and bring light to their lived histories. We affirm Native American sovereignty and acknowledge the sacrifices and contributions of Indigenous people of Puget Sound. We acknowledge the ongoing disparities, racism, and political erasure they face today and pledge to donate, promote resources, and educate about the struggles of the Coast Salish tribes. We raise our hands to honor Chief Seattle’s Duwamish tribe of Indigenous peoples past, present, and future. |
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