The Language Experience Method of Adult Literacy
The language experience approach links the forms of language: listening, speaking, reading, and writing. It uses the student’s experiences and language as the raw material. The method involves clients dictating stories to the tutor. When typed by the tutor, these stories become the basis of the student’s reading instruction. Through the language experience approach to reading, clients conceptualize written text as follows:
What I can think about, I can talk about.
What I can say, I can writer (or someone can write for me).
What I can write, I can read.
I can read what others write for me to read.
A Walk on Williamsbridge Road was produced as a bilingual flip book: when the English version is turned over, it reads as “Un Paseo por la Calle Williamsbridge.” The book began with an outing on which the literacy clients completed guided cloze note taking.
A Walk on Williamsbridge Road
by Alberta, Marisol & Pamela
of the Adult Literacy Program
Einstein College of Medicine
Bronx, New York
On
a hot and sunny afternoon, we walked one block to
Williamsbridge Road. The sky was blue and cloudless. We
passed ...
a bank,
a pizzeria,
a bakery,
an Italian deli,
a bodega,
a post office and
a supermarket.
In shop windows we saw ...
bread,
cookies and
pie.
We also saw
olive oil,
coffee and
vinegar.
Williamsbridge Road was crowded and busy.
We saw all kinds of vehicles:
cars,
vans,
buses,
taxis,
bicycles and
baby carriages.
We saw all kinds of people:
black, white, Asian, Spanish and Italian,
men, women, babies and school boys,
grandmothers and old men.
The people were ...
working,
shopping and
yelling.
If we could give a color to this day, we would call it a
blue day.