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Additional Comprehension Resources
ESL Literacy Readers offers 40 theme-based stories, a learner page, and a teacher's guide with ideas for reading activities and extensions. ESL Yes! offers 1600 stories intended for Beginning and Intermediate level ESL students, supplemented with audios and various kinds of exercises.
The Times in Plain English
This website contains free "Plain English Version" articles about current world and national news or events. All of the articles are edited by Arthur Schiff and grade-leveled according to Flesch-Kincaid. In addition to articles, the website offers Tips for Teachers, which provides text-dependent questions.
The Role of Vocabulary Instruction in Adult Basic Education
The author of this chapter analyzes research and theories about vocabulary acquisition, reading comprehension, and their inter-relationship. She presents proven practices for vocabulary instruction and makes other recommendations for research and policy.
Additional Fluency Resources
These Comprehension resources are also useful for Fluency instruction: * Britannica School Elementary offers non-fiction articles related images, videos, maps, and learning games * The Change Agent includes leveled student-written articles, discussion topics, and lesson plans * The Times in Plain English contains free, leveled articles about current world and national news or events * Center for Adult Literacy Text Library offers over 1600 leveled texts on a range of topics
Teaching Adults to Read
Five free online courses for adult educators who want to learn more about teaching the components of reading: alphabetics, fluency, vocabulary and comprehension. Each self-paced course can be completed in 2-4 hours.
Reading Skills for Today’s Adults – Fluency
This website is a source of passages (Levels 0.7 to 8.0) and audios intended “to help adults become better readers and more informed consumers, parents, employees, citizens and community members.” It is useful for Beginning and Intermediate level students.
Reading Skills for Healthcare Workers – Comprehension
This website provides 175 CNA (certified nursing assistant) and general healthcare passages and audios for adult readers at grade levels 5.5 to 8.5 (Intermediate level). All are CCRS aligned and include pre-reading questions, definitions of healthcare or high-frequency vocabulary, and text-dependent questions.
Comprehension: Research and Teaching Strategies
Research Digest No. 8 defines comprehension, provides suggestions for assessment and instruction, and lists additional resources and references.
Comprehension Instruction for STAR/EBRI Volunteers
This handout describes what STAR/EBRI volunteers need to know about evidence-based and explicit comprehension instruction. It focuses on teaching five strategies: 1) asking and answering questions, 2) finding topics, 3) identifying main idea sentences, 4) identifying key details or important steps, and 5) writing summaries.
Comprehension – Challenges & Possible Solutions
Common comprehension strategy instructional challenges and solutions developed by Minnesota STARs and Trainers.
Reading Skills for Today’s Adults – ESL
This website was designed to provide an online repository of leveled reading selections that are appropriate for and valued by adult learners. The readings being posted correspond to CASAS 200 - 235, focusing on topics such as Civics, Employment, Housing, Health, School, Money, and Government.
- CCRS
- Comprehension
- Curriculum Design
- ESL
- Fluency
- Formative Assessment
- Text-Dependent Questions
- Vocabulary
ReadWorks.org
ReadWorks provides a large, high-quality library of curated nonfiction and literary articles, along with reading comprehension and vocabulary lessons, formative assessments, and teacher guidance. Through this website teachers can access curriculum, lesson plans, and free training.
Rong Chang Listening Collection
This is a collection of online listening tracks for ESL learners. There is a wide range of topics and levels featured, and all of the sites include an audio track and a reading text.
Randall’s ESL Cyber Listening Lab
Randall’s ESL Cyber Listening Lab is an online, multimedia listening website designed to help ESOL students improve their listening comprehension skills in English. The website contains over 300 original learning quizzes and activities that cover functional language topics.
How Should Adult ESL Reading Instruction Differ From ABE Reading Instruction?
A brief from the Center for Adult English Language Acquisition (CAELA) summarizing the research base on adult English language learners (ELLs) learning to read. It describes how ELLs differ from native English speakers and how these differences should affect reading instruction.
New Resources
Story by Story (2008)
Story by Story was developed for Beginning ABE students needing (and wanting) systematic and contextual phonics instruction. However, it has been successfully used with many Beginning-Intermediate ESL students as well. This website provides 12 printable Story by Story lessons that each include the story text, a word study, and sentence-writing exercises.
Levels of Knowing Mathematics
This resource outlines the levels of knowing math proposed by Mahesh C. Sharma: intuitive, concrete/experiential, pictorial/representational, abstract, applications, and communication. The chart explains each level and gives an example of what that level would look like in the classroom.
Adult Diploma Forms
Find Standard Adult High School Diploma forms and checklists here.
Presenter Information
Get information about stipends, reimbursements, and other instructions for presenters.
MN ABE YouTube Channel
The MN ABE YouTube Channel is a free online PD resource that you can use to explore teaching techniques and classroom ideas in action! Find out more in this MN ABE Connect newsletter article.
Upcoming ABE Events
January 21, 2022
1:00 pm–3:00 pm
Online
Teaching Reading Vocabulary Remotely or In Person
Online
Registration Deadline: FRI. 1/21/22 Vocabulary is everyone’s favorite reading component! And helping students master reading vocabulary is a key to helping them master comprehension. But how many words should you teach? And which words are the most important? What strategies are best for helping students learn new words?… Learn More
Online
January 25, 2022
12:30 pm–1:15 pm
Online
MN Lunch & Learn: The Teacher’s Zone and the Admin Zone
Online
Registration Deadline: TUE. 1/25/22 In this session, we will cover the different functions of the Teacher’s Zone tile and the Admin Zone tile and what the differences are. NOTE: Attendees must have current login credentials for their BE account. Learn More
Online
January 25, 2022
6:30 pm–8:30 pm
Online
Core Training Module 4: Instructional Best Practices: Working with Materials
Online
Registration Deadline: TUE. 1/25/22 Participants learn about the types of materials that they may be working with, including prepared texts and realia. Participants also learn about the practice of explicit instruction, how to effectively give instructions, and suggestions for extending worksheets to maximize understanding and practice. Learn More
Online