Contextualization

The fourth aspect of facilitating learning for incarcerated youth is the buzzword of the 1990s: contextualization. According to the NYS Education Department’s Catalog of Efforts Underway to Contextualize Literacy and Integrate Basic and Occupational Education for Adults, literacy is a first crucial step toward the realization of personal, social, civic/political, and economic goals. Literacy provides vast opportunity to use familiar contexts to maximize learning. The document goes on to state that goals may be internal to the learner or the product of external pressures on the learner. The impact of this external pressure on intrinsic motivation has yet to be the focus of adequate discussion.

Whether the learner was internally or externally motivated, research over the past decade has belied the notion that teaching a skill enables the learner to apply that skill in several different circumstances. Thomas Sticht, the educator and author, initially addressed the difference that context makes to reading levels. He noted that the more familiar the context, the higher the reading level which may be achieved. He further contended that, unlike the generic skill notion described above, skill applications need to be separately taught for different situations—so critical is the context. Other studies have since determined that the power of the context actually determines whether instruction carries over to new situations.

Skilled teachers will not be surprised at the power of context in the efficiency of the learning process. Teachers have been providing context in instruction and inquiry since the beginnings of education. Decades later, contextualization has become a rather simplistic answer to meeting the demands of the changing workplace and the global economy for adult literacy programs. It has also become a catchall for any efforts to provide a context for instruction to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of the learning process.

The State Education Department, in defining its priorities for FY–1994, identified six (although clearly there are others) possible contexts: workplace literacy, family literacy, parenting education, life skills, career exploration, and occupational preparation. In these cases, contextualization can occur by modifying basic education to include as content the purpose for which adult students are attending. For example, agencies providing employment preparation education should either integrate basic skills with occupational education or collaborate with agencies offering occupational education.

Contextualization can be as simple as providing options appropriate for different contexts within a basic education curriculum. For example, communication skills are important for effective parenting and effective working. Choosing the workplace context, the ability to function within a team might be an important lesson. Instruction about the structure of a team and role-playing about how to get along with other team members would be appropriate. Communication within the family could be learned using one of the myriad of problems which confront parents—perhaps a teacher’s note sent home with the young child saying that he/she was disruptive in class. Learning about child developmental levels and appropriate interventions for the different levels would be part of instruction. Role-playing the actual intervention would complete the lesson.

Contextualization can be a vastly complicated process. Workplace Basics: The Skills Employers Want describes a comprehensive process for developing a basic workplace literacy program, i.e., teaching basic skills within the context of the workplace and its challenges. Briefly, this process includes: identifying job changes or problems related to basic workplace skills; building management and union support for skills training programs in workplace basics; presenting strategy and action plans to management and unions for approval; performing a task analysis of jobs; designing and developing the curriculum; implementing the program; and finally, evaluating and monitoring the program. This process is a lengthy and expensive one. It is important in training skilled workers, but far beyond the scope of the average adult education program.

Instructors in incarcerated education programs should intensify what they already do. Continue to use a learner–centered approach to instructional planning, spending time on goal-setting and tailoring each individual learning plan to include the context reflected in the goals. Contextualization for the workplace while still inside the facility can include basic education (if necessary) interwoven with job readiness skills such as resume writing, problem solving, and communication. As the student moves into the transitional phase and the demands of the worksite become more real, vocational training and needed basic skill instruction which provides the foundation for the worksite skills become more tangible. Related workplace skills, such as listening and communicating thoughts clearly, solving problems, and thinking creatively, all can become lessons which embody not only the context of a worksite but the potential job assignments as well. You will find several examples of contextualization in the sample lessons section.