Teaching Strategies
Recent Newsletter Articles
Conceptual Understanding in Instruction: It Really Works!
Hennepin County Corrections instructor Molley Bruce attended ATLAS's Math Institute, and was able to return to her classroom and immediately apply what she learned about conceptual understanding. She was thrilled at the results! Read More
Vocabulary Workouts
Check out this FREE curriculum to exercise your students’ knowledge and use of academic words! It's accessible in the Reading resource library on the ATLAS website. Read More
Skills to Pay the Bills
Learn about a valuable resource for teaching "soft" skills that should be of interest to ABE teachers looking to help their students build up the skills from the Navigating Systems category of the Transitions Integration Framework (TIF). Read More
Making Equations Visual to Enhance Understanding
Abby Roza from Hennepin County Corrections ABE describes how you can use visual models and engaging activities to teach about quadratic equations, and how these principles can also be applied to teaching basic mathematical operations. Read More
A Perspective on the Flipped Classroom
Amy Vickers, MNI Senior Consultant, shares her learnings from the COABE Conference about flipped classrooms, including a surprising take-away that changed her understanding of this pedadogical approach. Read More
Practical Takeaways from COABE
Danielle Legault, an instructor at Minneapolis Adult Education, synthesizes three key learnings from her attendance at a variety of sessions at the annual COABE (Commission on Adult Basic Education) Conference, touching on everything from low-level ESL to GED. Read More
Plan First, Write Second
One of my goals is to show my students how spending time in the planning stage pays off in a better finished product. The technique discussed here is a method of getting students to think about all of the ways that a topic could be discussed or explored. Read More
21st Century Demands on Adult Education
Are we, with current WIOA guidelines, required solely to prepare students to be good workers for the U.S. workforce, or do we also have a responsibility to be agents for social change, or at least to equip learners to be active, informed citizens? Read More
Gaining Confidence in English: Volunteer Coaches Make the Difference on Skype
Lakeville ABE's Skype Coaching program matches volunteer tutors with adult English learners for one-to-one coaching in English, giving English learners more opportunities to practice speaking and listening skills and to gain confidence using English in real-life contexts. Read More
New Evidence about Persistence
A summary of the findings from two studies on persistence and motivation in adult literacy programs. Reading skill development requires thousands of hours of instruction and practice; therefore, it takes persistence and motivation for adult readers to regularly attend reading classes and make educational level gains. Read More