Student Carlton Ricketts and tutor Merlene Clarke
When a tutor’s passion to teach is matched by a student’s hunger for learning, amazing progress can be made. Literacy Council tutor Merlene Clarke has a day job that keeps her plenty busy. She is the dynamic principal of Annapolis’s Phoenix Academy, a county school offering K-12 students a unique mix of alternative programs. While academics aren’t slighted at the Phoenix Academy, high school students there have an opportunity to actually learn by doing–raising agricultural crops, rearing animals, nurturing endangered terrapins, and mastering culinary skills.
Merlene is passionate about helping all of her students graduate from high school as good readers. Recently, she provided 25 of her teachers and staff with training to provide one-on-one tutoring for Phoenix students who struggle with reading, patterned after the Literacy Council’s tutor training curriculum. And she also continues to pass on the gift of literacy after hours. Merlene meets with Carlton Ricketts for 4 hours each week, because he, too, is eager to learn.
Jamaica-born and raised, Carlton has been living in this area for three years, working in the construction trades as a mason. He wants to improve his reading skills before he and his wife Shavonnie start a family, and is a truly motivated student. On his student intake form, Carlton indicated that he was available to meet with his tutor any night of the week!
Carlton is also hoping to succeed in the Anne Arundel Community College Adult Basic Skills (ABS) classes. Tutor Merlene Clarke shares that “Carlton is super energetic and eager to improve his reading skills. We meet for 4 hours a week for lessons and he is making amazing progress! He comprehends what he reads and infers quite well. It is my pleasure to work with Carlton.”
Clark and Ricketts
Jolene and Bob Caspar
Bob Caspar, our passionate and enthusiastic Literacy Council Board President for the past 5 years, passed away on November 14, 2016.
Bob is greatly missed! He was such a dear friend to the Literacy Council and to everyone who knew him. He was also a hero and champion for our students and tutors. Always the first to volunteer, donate and promote the Literacy Council, he and Jolene also provided a matching gift for every fundraiser.
Robert Caspar eulogy.
Great opportunity! Our next 2-day tutor training is scheduled for February 25th & March 4th from 9:00 am to 4:00 pm at Woods Memorial Presbyterian Church in Severna Park, and will include both Basic Literacy and English Language Learner instruction.
We have a class size limit of 35. If you, or someone you know, would be interested in attending this training, please email Lisa Vernon or call 410-269-4419 as soon as possible to reserve a seat.
A Syracuse icon who taught the world to read turns 100
Ruth Colvin, who turned 100 on Dec. 16, is the mother of the adult literacy movement in the U.S. She began Literacy Volunteers of America in 1962. In 2002, that organization merged with Laubach Literacy International to become
ProLiteracy, which is still based in Syracuse.
Colvin has taught hundreds of people to read. And her efforts, including training programs she has designed and published, have helped thousands learn to read. You might think that, at nearly 100, she is done. And that would still be extraordinary.
But Ruth Colvin is not just that amazing list of accomplishments. She golfs three times a week with women who are her daughter and granddaughter’s age: “No one my age plays,” she says.
It’s not uncommon to get an email from Colvin with the signature “Sent from my iPhone.” Her text messages ding away as she talks.
Colvin’s life lesson that she returns to is this: “Out of everything bad, something good comes.”
#GivingTuesday national results are in! Out of 976 small nonprofits competing for #GivingTuesday donations, our Literacy Council came in #25 for funds raised on Tuesday. #GivingTuesday Razoo Rankings.
Special thanks go to JoAnn and David Cook for submitting a $1,000 matching donation. We also received close to $1,000 of additional #GivingTuesday donations on Tuesday through PayPal and checks, bringing our #GivingTuesday total to over $4,500.
More good news! Anne Arundel County Literacy Council is #1 for top reviews in Anne Arundel County at greatnonprofits.org.
Gratefully,
Lisa Vernon, Executive Director
Lisa Vernon, Executive Director
Anne Arundel County Literacy Council
301-523-6750 (cell)
“In teaching others we teach ourselves.” – Proverbs
South County Tutors and Volunteers:
Our Sunday, December 4, 2016 Get-Together will be rescheduled for January, since December is such a busy time of year. Date to be announced.
Tutor Lois Crawley and Latrice
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Latrice, a mother of two school-aged children and deli employee at Geresbeck’s Food Market, manages to juggle her busy schedule to meet regularly with tutor Lois Crawley at the Glen Burnie library.
Because Latrice had enjoyed working in childcare for many years, her aspirations involve enrolling at Anne Arundel Community College one day to take childcare classes–and eventually opening her own in-home daycare center. She has an impressive list of shorter-term goals, too: registering to vote, getting a driver’s license, reading a newspaper, and more actively helping her children with their homework.
Please make a year-end gift on #GivingTuesday (11/29/16) so more adults like Latrice can achieve their dreams.
Rosalyn and tutor Lynette Delprete
Recently Rosalyn and I agreed that each of us would write a paragraph in our journals during the week and then share it with one another when we meet on Wednesdays.
Because so much of our tutoring time is spent correcting grammar and GED related exercises – not typically “fun” stuff, I wanted her to see that writing can be fun. There are no rules to this journal writing except that we are to write about ANYTHING that comes to mind, and we are not to worry about grammar, punctuation, capitalization and the like for this assignment.
Well, as you can see, for her FIRST week, she wrote a beautiful paragraph about her dreams of a high school diploma and her doubts about fulfilling that dream. I love the analogy comparing her journey to that of mothering a baby. With Rosalyn’s permission, I am sharing this assignment with you:
Tutor Resources for TABE Reading Comprehension
Julia, my latest student, was referred to the Literacy Council this past summer by Anne Arundel Community College (AACC). She had passed all but one part of the TABE test – reading comprehension (which she had taken and failed twice). Julia had to pass that final part of the TABE test in order to be admitted to the dental assistant training program at AACC.
Now I am happy to report that Julia passed the reading comprehension portion of the TABE test! She will be entering the dental assistant training program at AACC in January.
Here are websites where I found useful teaching material aimed specifically at TABE reading comprehension:
TABE Reading Comprehension Resources
