Liberation or Reproduction

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International Journal of Qualitative

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Liberation or reproduction: exploring meaning in college

students' adult literacy tutoring
Linda Ziegahn
Online Publication Date: 01 January 1999
To cite this Article: Ziegahn, Linda (1999) 'Liberation or reproduction: exploring
meaning in college students' adult literacy tutoring', International Journal of
Qualitative Studies in Education, 12:1, 85 101
To link to this article: DOI: 10.1080/095183999236349
URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/095183999236349
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Q U ALITAT IVE STU D IES IN ED UCATIO N , 1999, V OL. 12, N O . 1, 85 101
Liberation or reproduction : exploring meaning in

college students adult literacy tutoring
L IN D A ZIE G A H N
T he M cG regor School, Antioch U niversity
K A TH LE EN A . HIN CH M A N
School of Education, Syracuse U niversity
The purpose of this paper is to explore the voices of college-level literacy tutors as they come to
understan d their work with less literate adults. The design of th is inquiry b egan within th e
phenomen ological traditions of sym bolic interactionism (Blumer, 1969). Q ualitative data
gathered included eld notes, interview tran scrip ts, and student journals. Initial analysis resulted
in categories that represented concrete aspects of the tutoring experience. Analysis also revealed
that a large part of tutors attention was spent in considerin g their own position relative to those
with wh om they worked : d iscovering how they learned best as a base for considering the learning
of others, negotiating an edu cational role with adu lt learners, an d identifying th eir place in th e
world of educational ` ` haves and ` ` have-nots. Some of the tutors words suggested an
awakening to inequities throughout the educational system , which pu sh ed the an alysis into a
m ore interpretive arena (D enzin, 1989 ; Schwandt, 1994). Initial categories were reconsidered to
develop a larger cultural representation of tu tor success and literacy. Students interp retations
were further contrasted with the th eories of critical pedagogues and with education al practice,
both in literacy education sites and in u niversity classrooms. Suggestions are made as to why there
is a lack of connection betw een critical theories and practice at the levels of both b asic and higher
education.
Introduction
Literacy enhancement has been described by some as the tool through which the social,
political, and economic fabric of community life can be challenged (Freire, 1970, 1985).
However, such transformative goals do not appear to match those of the more
pragmatic adult literacy programs of most public schools and not-for-pro t
organizations in the United States (M ezirow, D arkenwald, & Knox, 1975). Instead,
programs are concerned with developing adults beginning reading skills or helping
them to gain high school credentials, and program success is determined by enrollment,
improvement in reading skills, or diploma achievement. Despite the frequent use of
dramatic personal stories in fundraising e orts, personal and societal transformations
are not usually considered indications of success. Perpetually underfunded, such
programs regularly look to community volunteers for assistance (Freer, 1995 ; Ilsley,
1989).
College students often turn to literacy tutoring as a means of enhancing their
intellectual, moral, ethical, and personal development (Kendall, 1990 ; Thorpe, Allen,
& Shearer, 1992). W hile their interest in this service seems to provide a productive
match between need and resources, the nature of such communion is less clear. College
students live in a climate that represents ` ` an intersection of social mobilities [where]
International J ournal of Qualitative Studies in Education
ISSN 0951-8398 print} ISSN 1366-5898 online 1999 Taylor & Francis L td
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86
linda ziegahn and kathleen a . hinchman
people come and go, bringing with them all kinds of energy, ideas, interests,
backgrounds, aspirations and projections (G oldberg, 1994, p. 24). Thus, their lives are
di erent from those of their literacy learners, and both college students and literacy
learners are likely to realize these di erences as they work together. In working
together, both have the chance to change their own life circumstances, to cross borders,
in the words of Giroux (1992) college students by experiencing the struggles of adult
literacy learners and adult literacy learners by gaining skills and credentials of increased
control and access. However, how do college students perceive their experiences as
literacy tutors ? How do they understand their literacy learners and the circumstances
of their lives ? How do the perspectives of college students help us to understand the
borders between campus and the adult literacy community ?
In the paper which follows, we attempt to represent and interpret the voices of
college student-tutors with whom we have worked as they come to understand literacy
and their work with less literate adults. W e begin with a description of the theoretical
framework for our work, followed by a description of the methodology of our inquiry.
N ext, we present an explanation of results, described by coding category. Finally, we
explore the problems and possibilities inherent in college students occupation of a
border space between their lives as students and their e orts in the larger community.
Critical literacy and related concepts

Our work is framed by our concern for literacy as a tool of equity and access and for the
manner in which we represent individuals struggles to be literate to our own college
students. Such concern for critical literacy in particular addresses the contradiction
between what schools claim they do and what they actually do (Escobar, Fernandez, &
G uevara-Niebla with Freire, 1994 ; Freire, 1985, 1990 ; Giroux, 1992, 1994 ; Greene,
1986 ; hooks, 1994 ; M cLaren & Lankshear, 1993). Such theories can be traced to the
Progressive movement of John D ewey (1966 } 1916) and have focused in the latter half
of the 20th century on constructing an active role for basic literacy education in political
and social development in Latin America and Africa (Freire, 1970 ; Freire & M acedo,
1987). Among the tasks of such an approach to education are the revelation and
exploration of the consistencies and contradictions in students experiences with
education (Giroux, 1992) and the development of re ective thought and reconstructive
action (Brennan, 1987 ; Kirk, 1986 ; Liston & Zeichner, 1987). According to G iroux
(1992), one purpose of higher education is to a rm existing views of the world and to
create new ones, both intensely political and deeply normative. Universities should be
about dreaming of a better world, where educators and students can think critically
about how knowledge is produced and transformed in relation to a larger world
characterized by asymmetrical power relations : ` ` The language of education that
students take with them from their university experience should embody a vision
capable of providing them a sense of history, civic courage, and democratic community
(p. 91).
In Giroux s view, then, the role of the educator is to provide students with the
opportunity to analyze ways in which the dominant culture creates ` ` borders saturated
in terror, inequality, and forced exclusions (G iroux, 1992, p. 174). It is not enough to
allow space for the disenfranchised to be heard. E ducators, instead, must lead in the
forging of political communities in which di erence and particularity are not contrary
liberation or reproduct ion
87
to political unity (G iroux, 1992 ; M ou e, 1988). It means moving beyond merely

celebrating di erence to engaging creatively in a struggle for equality.
[T]he pedagogical borderlands where blacks, whites, latinos, and others meet
demonstrate the importance of a multicentric perspective that allows teachers,
cultural workers, and students to not only recognize the multilayered and
contradictory ideologies that construct their own identities but to also analyze
how the di erences within and between various groups can expand the potential
of human life and democratic possibilities. (Giroux, 1992, p. 175)
The borders that are the meeting ground between groups cannot be disassociated from
the power held by each group. D i erence is never free-standing, nor are di erences
absolute and intractable. Rather they are socially and culturally relational (M cLaren,
1994). As Freire (1970) points out, in the dialogue that must take place between
oppressed and oppressor, some will work to maintain existing structures, others to
change them. As explained by Janmohamed (1994), Freire s pedagogy advocates the
nurturing of intellectuals who will cross borders and develop strong antagonisms in the
process. Caught between the dominant group s practices and the resultant poverty,
peasants (in Freire s case of Latin America ; in this study, students, teachers, and literacy
learners) turn to an examination of the borders that con ne them. Poverty and abuse
are among the social, political, and economic ` ` codi cations, or ` ` knowable objects,
that ` ` border intellectuals can break down and put back together again.
Often the peasants with whom Freire has worked over the years learn to read along
with the decodi cation process. This acquisition of literacy is theorized as an active step
that redraws the nature of their relationship with the dominant class, including the
boundaries that once separated them, leading to the formation of new alliances and a
reawakening of hope. W hile literacy programs in the United States are not typically
orchestrated according to Freirian principle (M ezirow et al., 1975), the people who
enroll in them do so, ostensibly, to gain skills or credentials that will give them access to
otherwise inaccessible segments of society. It is by considering such border crossings, as
experienced and observed by our college student-tutors, that we examine the themes of
college student tutors considering their own literacy and the literacy of their adult
students.
M ethodology
M ethodology for this inquiry led to a two-tiered analysis. Initial inquiry was guided by
the assumption that nding meaning in complex social contexts means trying to gain
access to the perspectives of the settings participants. Systematic, multilayered study of
what people say and do in such settings provides a way to discern meanings that evolve
from the symbolic interactions within these settings (Blumer, 1969 ; Denzin, 1989).
Because they provide the opportunity to capture actions and words over time and from
multiple directions, participant observation, in-depth interviewing, and document
analysis are consistent with such an interpretive phenomenological perspective.
Similarly consistent is constant comparison as a method of analysis and subsequent
development of theory that is grounded in participants views of the setting (Bogdan &
Biklen, 1992 ; G laser & Strauss, 1967). The second phase of our analysis was more
interpretive (Schwandt, 1994), leading us to the critical literacy literature as we
88
grappled with our nal research question relating to the borders between campus and
community.
Participan ts
O ur roles as teacher- researchers : Our roles in this inquiry were as teachers of a university
course in adult literacy education and as researcher-authors of this paper, interested in
our students growing perspectives toward literacy and equity. W hile our inquiry was
not meant as a direct critique of our pedagogy per se, we realize that we are implicated
as possible sources for at least some of our students perspectives, and we know that our
teaching will necessarily change because of the insights we gain from this work. W e also
know that our teaching of this practicum-based course has been typical, with a dual
concern for surveying academic terrain and for helping students to be welcomed
comfortably into existing educational institutions. Thus, we think our re exive
interpretation of our students insights may be helpful to others who nd themselves in
similar situations.
Our work took place at a mid-sized university in the northeast United States. W e
taught a class in adult literacy education together for four semesters to university
undergraduates from a variety of majors. These students served as tutors in adult basic
education classrooms throughout the community. In these classrooms, literacy learners
worked on basic skills, high school equivalency diplomas, speci c skills for job training,
or English pro ciency for primary speakers of other languages. In addition to tutoring
for roughly 60 hours over a semester, undergraduates spent two hours each week in a
seminar on adult learning theory and literacy education. During this time, we discussed
and critiqued models of adult literacy education ; strategies for helping less literate
adults with math, reading, and writing ; questions students brought back to the
university classroom from tutoring sites ; and the implications of their work for their
postgraduate lives.
W e especially felt an obligation to prepare our undergraduate students for the
di cult lives that caused many adult students to interrupt their schooling in the rst
place. W e felt that a respect for the adult learner meant not perpetuating the various
` ` de cits (Fingeret, 1983 ; Ziegahn, 1992) or stigmas that often plague such students.
W e wanted them to understand, instead, that characterizing learners based on their
problems would not aid the tutors in helping their own students to learn. Our strategy
was to discuss and read about these issues further as undergraduate students asked us
about speci c incidences that they found either intriguing, puzzling, or, in some cases,
shocking. Our intent was to use these issues to help students better understand literacy
learners interest in learning as well as the life circumstances that both shaped this
interest and rendered it challenging.
To be explicit, our intent was pragmatic and re ective, concerned primarily with
introducing college students to the range of programming in the adult literacy
community and with helping them to understand what they met there as a basis for
reconsidering literacy-related issues within the context of their society. For example,
instructional methodologies presented in the class sessions included popular adult
tutoring methods taught by two of the major volunteer tutoring associations in the
United States as well as tutoring strategies espoused in major reading journals (e.g.,
D avidson & W heat, 1989 ; Flint-Ferguson & Youga, 1987 ; Keefe & M eyer, 1988 ;
Lewkowicz, 1987 ; W ade & Reynolds, 1989). These strategies focused on such issues as
the role of evaluation in literacy learning, the teaching of decoding skills to older adults,
89
the use of a computer in literacy instruction, and the development of metacognitive

awareness. In addition to concrete strategies for tutoring, other broad categories of
readings included de nitions of literacy, types of adult literacy programs, characteristics
of adult learners, history of literacy } schooling, and ties to assessment, multiculturalism,
and trends in legislation.
W ithin these topics, speci c issues of whole language, family literacy, participatory
education, and social networks around literacy learning were presented. W hile we did
not consider ourselves critical pedagogues per se, issues of critical literacy emerged in
accounts of adult learners social networks (Fingeret, 1983) and particularly in
literature addressing aspects of culture and literacy (Freire, 1970 ; Heath, 1983 ; Hunter,
1982 ; R odriguez, 1982). Critical literacy issues were also discussed within the larger
context of our survey of adult literacy education as we reviewed students insights and
saw explicit connections to the larger markers of cultural participation.
Colleg e student tutor s : Of the 51 students we worked with over four semesters, four were
African-Americans, two Hispanics, and the rest wh ite Americans, ve men and 46
women. To gain insights into the understandings of these informants over three
semesters, we considered several sources of data : (a) participant observation eld notes
of tutoring episodes and some classes, (b) students written statements of beginning-ofsemester expectations, (c) students journal entries for each tutoring session, and (d)
open-ended, end-of-semester interviews. A graduate assistant collected the eld notes
from classes and tutoring sessions and shared them with us during the course of each
semester.
W e began analyzing data using the constant comparative method (G laser &
Strauss, 1967). That is, we read and reread data, comparing apparent perspectives
among individual tutors and meeting several times to test coding categories on each
other. W e sorted data into emerging categories using E thnograph, a computer program
that produced printed copies of data sorted by code. Initial categories represented both
participant observation and self-report data quite literally, including descriptions of
setting, tting into the setting, tutoring activities, learning about learners, learning
about tutoring, and re ecting on literacy and culture. As in other literacy studies that
have relied upon student journal analysis (Johnson, Lazar, & Bean, 1990 ; Lawson,
R yan, & W interowd, 1989), data fell into both cognitive and a ective categories.
W ith time and analysis and with recognition of the subjectivities inherent in
students self-reports, we became most intrigued by the college students words about
their own tutoring experience. Their journals emerged as our primary source of insight.
In an e ort to position the students insights in relation to larger contextual issues, our
consideration of these data took on more of the character of interpretive interactionism
(Denzin, 1989 ; Schwandt, 1994). That is, we began to consider explanations for ` ` how
interacting individuals connect their lived experiences to the cultural representations of
those experiences (Schwandt, 1994, p. 74). Initial categories that described university
tutors perspectives on entry into the literacy education site, their activities, and their
learning about adult learners and about tutoring (see Table 1) contributed to our
development of a larger thematic representation of tutor success and literacy as related
to issues of critical literacy. Students brought up such ideological connections in relation
to their more day-to-day concerns, showing evidence of the kind of border crossing they
engaged in as relatively privileged college students.
90
Table 1.
Initial categories
B reaking the ice :

` ` The jitters
Feeling unproductive
G etting asked for help
Learning about learners lives (` ` cold dose of reality )
` ` Fitting in
Figuring out how to help :
Tutors strategies
N ot having the answ ers
D iagnosing
R em em bering own experiences as learners
Figuring out role of teacher} tutor
R eactions to tutoring experience:
Feeling rewarded
learner progress
learn er con den ce
feeling useful, con dent
Feeling frustrated
learners lack of p rogress
Feeling sad
leaving site
learners may not continue
T utor stance :
Toward education
Toward literacy
R esults
W e recorded observations of the tutors in interactions with adult learners and in our
class, teaching and talking about teaching, learning, literacy, and the larger society.
Their voices in class and within the more private contexts of their journals re ected their
own realities as students in the university as well as in elementary and secondary
schools. Other observations included analyses of the nature of literacy and education,
expectations of what they would experience in working as literacy tutors, and actual
experiences in working as tutors. W e considered the convergence of these re ections as
the basis for a theory of teaching success, that is, how tutors made sense of the experience
of working with less literate adult learners.
W e should note, before proceeding, that the observations of student-tutors may seem
predictable to most readers. M ost of our students were relatively young, and we think
their words re ect generalizations they have gleaned from our culture s stories about
why people do things the way they do rather than from direct experience. W e think that
their words are a powerful reminder of the thinking that is apt to drive much service
interaction when one of the parties in the discourse is a novice who does not understand
the day-to-day life of the other party.
In general, tutors indicated that they felt most successful when tutoring was
apparently worth the e ort, that is, when they felt useful. M ore speci cally, tutors felt
rewarded when their students made apparent progress in either literacy learning or in
personal growth or when learners expressed gratitude for their assistance. Feeling
successful also meant that the boundaries between tutor and literacy student roles were
blurred, and there was a sense of equality and ` ` learning together. Conversely, tutors
experienced a lack of success when students made little or no progress, when they did not
91
ask for help when it was apparent to the tutors that help was needed, when they did not
take their work in the literacy classroom ` ` seriously, or wh en they failed to show up for
class. These gaps led tutors to feel that they were ` ` wasting their time.
Tutors feelings of success or the lack thereof evolved over the 3 months that they
spent as literacy tutors. E ntering the site initially was most chaotic, as tutors struggled
to calm their nervousness about engaging in a new experience and as they negotiated
relationships with a group of adult students who generally represented a social class and
sometimes an ethnic background that was unfamiliar to them. Once comfortable, the
next challenge was guring out how to actually help less literate adult students and
trying to understand the source of problems. Finally, tutors had to make a transition out
of the literacy site and to situate their understandings within the larger context of their
understandings of how the world works.
Breaking the ice
Today was my rst tutoring session. I really had a case of the jitters, not knowing
what to expect.
College students were given broad instructions during their class sessions at the
university ` ` nd ways to help learners with their work, whatever it is meant to
prepare them for a variety of tutoring placements. The majority of student-tutors felt
challenged by the opportunity to forge their own way. Nonetheless, most entered the
rst day with the ` ` jitters, highly anxious about how learners would accept them and,
most important, their o ers of assistance. ` ` No one asked for help I can t do what I m
supposed to do was heard frequently in the initial days of tutoring. Thus, a critical
marker in college students comfort level came with literacy learners requests for
assistance. Initiation of requests for and o ers of assistance gradually became more
regular as tutors came to see classroom teachers and literacy learners as ` ` not hostile
and as tutors gathered con dence in their own skills. Some tutors reported not feeling
welcomed by literacy learners at rst, but, as one young woman put it, ` ` The ice begin
to break when I worked with individuals. M y help was requested by three di erent
students; it was a powerful experience.
Tutors reported that literacy learners ` ` who used to refuse [help] asked for
assistance in a variety of circumstances, e.g., ` ` even in the hall ; ` ` even though they re
older than me ; ` ` instead of the (classroom) teacher.
The resentment felt by some that literacy learners were merely ` ` letting them
intrude dissipated, and as one tutor suggested, ` ` Fitting in isn t too hard the people
who attend classes here are committed to learning and are willing to accept help in any
form that it comes. For many tutors, this time period was also when initial relationships
formed with those students whom they helped on a regular basis. Feelings of nervousness
gave way to feelings of excitement about the prospect of working with the challenges of
low literacy. For tutors who thought of themselves as ` ` very approachable and helpful,
it was illuminating to them to realize that they would not necessarily like all the literacy
learners they were there to help and that literacy learners could and did help each other
out. Tutors also learned that if literacy learners did not request their help, it was possible
that they either needed to work things out on their own or to get help from other sources.
Fitting into the setting and into the rhythm of tutoring was but one of the challenges
tutors faced in their initial days in the classroom. Perhaps equally challenging for tutors
was trying to understand the life circumstances of adult students who were often of quite
92
di erent social and economic backgrounds. University student tutors were usually
white middle-class Americans, while the adults enrolled in literacy classes, in addition
to having less formal education than their tutors, were frequently also of di erent
economic, ethnic, or racial backgrounds than tutors.
Tutors were intrigued by stories about literacy learners drug abuse, about domestic
violence, about the student ` ` who s my age and has two kids already , and about the
woman who had given up several children for adoption and was now hoping to have
more. For example, one said :
He said he did a lot of drugs when he was younger and that it fried his brain. There
are times when he ll be working on a problem, and all of a sudden, he forgets what
he s doing. It s scary. This tutoring is a cold dose of reality.
It was not that the college students were totally naive about the lives of undereducated
people who tended to live in poverty. Rather, they had seldom gotten to know people
with serious personal, social, and economic problems on a personal level. They were
amazed at the story of a literacy student who had been red from her job as a bartender
because she ` ` couldn t spell and of learners who ` ` didn t know about FICA, about
credit union dues, and who had no idea how to do fractions because they had never
been presented with the concept. This intrigue and amazement was tinged with
admiration for literacy learners who came back to school despite seemingly crushing
personal circumstances, and with gratitude for not having been born poor. Some tutors
distanced themselves from these life circumstances, a few identi ed with them, and
others re ected upon their own good fortune to have been born and raised in more
favorable circumstances.
W hen confronted with literacy learners absences, tutors were able to make
connections with what they had learned during their weekly university classes.
Stereotypes about literacy learners were sometimes con rmed : ` ` I guess he s kind of
what I pictured when I had my original image of GED students. He was kicked out of
school in the ninth grade for punching a teacher. In other cases, stereotypes were
broken : ` ` He was a very intelligent middle-aged man. [The teacher] agreed with me
that he didn t seem like ` the average adult basic education student.
Another part of tting into the literacy education site was establishing the trusting
relationships that preceded actually helping with literacy : ` ` You have to gure out how
to build con dence rst before going on with the technical stu . As tutors grew more
con dent in their interpersonal and tutoring skills, they reported seeing more con dence
in adult students. One of the most rewarding aspects of the tutoring experience was
precisely this increased con dence. They connected this to their university readings :
` ` [The learner s increased con dence] veri ed all of the material that I read about on
the self-esteem factor involved in adult basic education. Gaining literacy learners
trust was only the rst step, however : ` ` R on told me I could read and he can t, so he ll
trust me. The good part is I have his trust ; the bad part is he expects miracles.
Figuring out how to help
I know it makes sense to me, but will it make sense to them ?

Tutoring sometimes resembled a dance, as tutors grappled with decisions about when
to lead hesitant literacy learners and when to follow as learners gained con dence.
93
Tutors helped literacy learners to assess the limitations of approaching problems in old
and familiar ways. At the same time, they encouraged literacy learners to draw upon
their unique strengths in learning new material :
I told him that he knows how to do these math problems, but we just have to brush
up on them. His knowledge is just buried deep down ; it is only a matter of time
before we nd it.
Tutors got used to reading textbooks and adapting exercises to the needs of their
students and to ` ` imitating the [literacy classroom] teacher when they saw a behavior
or philosophy that they felt was pedagogically useful. However, tutors varied in their
trust of their own learning strategies as guidelines for how to work with students. In
teaching sign numbers, one tutor said it was ` ` di cult to explain because the book
teaches one way, and I learned a di erent way. This tutor went on to explain his way.
Another tutor suggested, however, that :
The way I would have gone about solving the problem was not the way I knew
I should explain it to the student. The ` shortcuts were only to be used after the
student mastered the proper way to solve the problem.
Tutors learned to gauge how far to push literacy learners as they tackled new material,
stopping short of discouragement, yet urging a stretch beyond the zone of comfort : ` ` As
I sat and worked with him, I gradually stopped reading the problems aloud. Finally,
when we got through one problem and I didn t start reading the next, he jumped in and
read it aloud himself. Knowing when to intervene was not a clear-cut issue : ` ` D oes she
want suggestions from me or not ? Or does she want to do things her own way ?
Developing ways to deal with literacy learners emotional issues around new
learning was as important as addressing more cognitive issues : ` ` Before moving to
another subject or section of the chapter or even leaving him to work independently, I
would say something like ` how s this feel, or ` are you all right with this ? , very gently
but not patronizing. W hen tutors observed literacy learners becoming dependent on
them, they interpreted this dependence negatively. Tutors wanted literacy learners to
move on to more independent learning strategies as soon as possible : ` ` I try to give her
security about her knowledge in math in a subtle way so it doesn t seem fake. I will say
to her in a joking way, ` See, you know what you re doing ; you don t need me .
Tutors had to get used to the idea that literacy learners were encountering for the
rst time problems they had learned to solve long ago : ` ` It was something that came so
naturally to me that I could not think of how to break it down into steps for her. Some
tutors were able to identify with the hurdles that learners faced and to communicate
their personal stories to learners :
I told Alice wh at happened to me, and that she wasn t learning disabled. I was in
English honors when I was in the ` ` slow learners geometry class. I told her
sometimes it takes people longer to learn some things than others.
As a way of coming up with teaching strategies, tutors found it useful to re ect upon
their own experiences as learners, as far back as childhood : ` ` I have to think back to how
I learned long division. Tutors learned to ask the same question in a variety of ways,
to give illustrations from their own experience, and to encourage learners to do the same
in order to make relevant connections to the problem at hand. Tutors especially liked
being able to help learners connect with the real world :
94
W hat really excited him was my answer to his question, ` ` what will I ever be able
to use this stu for ? At rst I didn t know what to tell him, then I remembered
his interest in the nancial world and investments. I was able to teach
something which was really important to him.
Tutors learned early in their tenure that they would not necessarily have all the answers
to learners questions, especially in the area of mathematics. W hile this was disconcerting
at rst, tutors gradually got used to not having to be the experts, as did their students:
` ` They really got a charge out of knowing that even the ` college girl didn t always have
the right answer. Not being the expert also provided a gateway into setting a more
egalitarian tone in the student tutor literacy student relationship : ` ` I made sure he
knew that I wasn t the greatest at this I wanted him to realize that he knew just as
much about fractions as I did. Over a period of time, tutors gained con dence and
experience in choosing particular strategies for literacy learners :
She said she never understood fractions. I started to explain, but she looked
confused. So I asked her if she liked cooking. I asked her, does she ever double
recipes ? Then, you know how to do fractions !
T rying to understand
Tutors wanted to understand the reasons for what they perceived as literacy learners
literacy problems. They would try out potential hypotheses that in many cases were
linked to the development of a strategy : ` ` She s just having trouble getting her thoughts
out. As long as she can decide what to write, she shouldn t have a problem. Tutors
frequently put forth a straightforward attribution of cause and e ect : ` ` He made lots of
mistakes because he tried to rush through everything, or ` ` The teacher told me Joe s
long-term memory was not good ; that s probably wh y he gets so frustrated. In
situations like these, tutors de ned their task as getting more information from the
student and developing a way of helping them overcome barriers to learning.
In their e orts to make sense of literacy learners problems, tutors sometimes went
beyond hypothesizing to arrive at what seemed to us premature conclusions about the
reasons for di culties with either literacy or learning : ` ` She s got low self-esteem which
stems from her abusive boyfriend, or ` ` She isn t doing her homework because she gets
too involved with the others outside of class. These conclusions were often accompanied
by diagnoses of a clinical, judgmental nature, re ecting the ` ` teacher as expert role
many had perhaps learned through earlier schooling : ` ` His entire problem is that he
won t slow down and do all the steps, or ` ` His attention span is not where it should be.
I don t think he s ` slow but he does not retain knowledge successfully.
A ` ` good student } ` ` bad student dichotomy also emerged from tutors accounts.
Bad students ` ` didn t do all the steps, ` ` talked to their friends during class, ` ` didn t
pay attention, ` ` read too fast, ` ` didn t read the directions, ` ` didn t value knowledge
for its own sake, and were ` ` lazy. ` ` G ood students, on the other hand, ` ` did the work
easily, ` ` worked at home ve hours a night, ` ` were there to learn and understand,
` ` questioned why things were done, ` ` really tried hard, even if they didn t succeed,
` ` had it together, and ` ` were grateful for my help. One tutor contrasted the E SL
learner she most enjoyed with a more problematic G ED learner :
D uk s such a pleasure to work with, he s so into learning. He s got an amazing
memory. Fred, on the other hand, lacks motivation to even go through this
95
program. N ow, how is a person like this going to nish this class and pass the
G ED ?
Tutors were faced with dilemmas in which they had to nd a way out of their frustration
in working with particular literacy learners. One tutor was annoyed that literacy
learners were talkative to the extent that ` ` they didn t know when enough was enough,
and it was time to return to their work. She went beyond a simple characterization of
students who weren t exhibiting ` ` good student behavior to re ect on her own
confusion on how to respond :
I guess I could say something about quieting down, but they are not children, and
I shouldn t treat them as such. Th ey are there for themselves, not for me. I suppose
it is up to them to set their own paces. I would like to, however, try to motivate
them.
Tutors despaired over learners who weren t taking their education as seriously as tutors
thought they should : ` ` M y whole life I ve been taught that education is the most
important thing and to come here and see this gets to you. Other tutors took learners
lack of progress as a challenge :
His homework shows that this material has not sunk in and that my tutoring is not
e ective enough. I need to keep with this and realize this is my rst time with an
adult learner. This thought keeps me going !
Rewards of tutor ing
I love seeing a face light up when things are understood.

W orking with learners as equals and getting to the point where the boundaries between
teacher and learner blurred was an exciting outcome for tutors. Learners who expressed
gratitude were especially appreciated, as were those who made observable progress.
He had so looked forward to and valued the time that we would be working
together that he made up his own lesson plan. He said, ` ` W ell, I really appreciate
all that you re doing for me. I don t want to waste a minute.
Boundaries between teacher and student grew less distinct: ` ` He thanked me. I told
him I enjoyed working with him, but he had done the work. Another tutor reported
asking his learner to explain his method of approaching a problem, after which he as
tutor would then explain his approach, a way of working that ` ` supported the concept
that education can be a two-way process.
Pride, joy, and happiness were the emotions tutors felt when learners progressed, or
when they were at least making the e ort. ` ` W hether individuals were taking the TABE
[Test of Adult Basic Education] tests or simply trying to master speci c topics, everyone
was working. Tutors positive feelings were integrally linked with learners adherence
to the work ethic. These were the ` ` good students. Th eir progress was only partly
academic ; tutors were equally excited about the gains learners made in personal growth
and self-con dence. They reveled in the learners who could ` ` do the whole workbook
without the tutor s help.
The converse of the elation tutors felt when learners progressed was the despair and
frustration experienced when learners were not learning at the rate expected, or worse,
96
when learners did not even show up. Tutors spoke often of learners ` ` nally getting the
grasp of a new concept. As the level of frustration rose, observations re ected
desperation : ` ` He s just not getting it I don t know what to do with him. At times like
this, tutors seemed to alternate between wanting to chastise recalcitrant learners and
pushing themselves to understand why learners were experiencing di culty.
Then, at the end of the semester, students found leaving their tutoring sites a
wrenching experience. They were hopeful that their learners would continue along the
path that they as tutors had helped to set. As they wrote their nal journal entries, they
spoke of ` ` appreciating the diversity, the unique needs, abilities, and expectations of
people and ` ` loving watching and helping others learn.
T he big pictur e
W hat is going on in these schools that makes young people want to drop out ?
These people are not being reached ; they re getting lost.
A number of tutors questioned a society in which so many young people never nished
school in the traditional 12 or 13 years. They contrasted the typical school experience
that focuses on ` ` accumulating knowledge in preparation for exams with the adult
basic education classroom, which compared favorably :
Students in this environment have longer periods of time to prepare and can learn
on their own with help if it s needed. Th ey take the test when they re ready, not
at the teacher s discretion. I wonder if this isn t a better system for learning and
retaining more knowledge.
At the same time, after seeing a teacher go through a particularly rough week with
de ant adult literacy learners, a young tutor expressed disbelief that ` ` tutoring was
what she did for a living. Tutors also re ected on what they themselves had gotten out
of traditional high schools and wondered if GE D students might be missing out
somehow.
It seems like he s missing a lot by getting a G ED instead of a real high school
diploma. I guess one can justify that by saying in his life, he doesn t really need to
know all that other information. But isn t that attitude cheating him ? M aybe
M ark would like to learn calculus and things like that.
Tutors questioned procedures in some of the classrooms and came up with suggestions
for getting learners more involved in instructional decisions. In some instances, they
questioned practices that the academic world has also found less than useful in literacy
education : ` ` Please tell me, what is the point of diagramming sentences ? Tutors also
tried to understand how ` ` grown people felt in being labeled as ` ` learning disabled
or ` ` dyslexic, concluding that although such labels might serve a purpose, they could
also be very degrading. One tutor went as far as to suggest that ` ` the whole concept of
labeling should be thrown out the window all together ! The tendency in literacy
classrooms to equate testing and assessment with actual learning was also disturbing to
our college student tutors. One tutor concluded that ` ` education is more of a continuous
process, not just a collection of test grades or credit hours. Tutors saw an additional
need in the literacy curriculum for more need-speci c ` ` seminars about child care
options, budgeting, and other services that they felt would ` ` open doors for adult
literacy learners.
97
Tutors learned more about the economics of adult basic education and worried
about the literacy learners who might have to switch to another class location if the local
adult basic education site closed. They also expressed concern about younger students
whose youthful exuberance made it di cult for older students to concentrate. But most
of all, literacy tutors feared for those adults wh o had little education or whose negative
experiences with school in the past were too vivid to make sticking with literacy
education a desirable option. For instance, one tutor remarked, ` ` Street smarts will only
get you so far. Combined with this concern for literacy learners was an echoing of a
common theme of some national literacy movements that ` ` Illiteracy can lead to the
downfall of American supremacy in the work place ; if we don t ght this problem of
illiteracy, we will lose business to our foreign counterparts.
Some tutors came into the tutoring environment with an interest in social,
egalitarian issues: I was hoping to talk to Harry about social justice. Not in those
terms, of course, but in terms that make sense to him. I wanted to ask him about
di culties he has had in the past because of his lack of reading ability.
Along similar lines, tutors concern for the poverty and abusive backgrounds of many of
their individual students seemed to broaden their view of larger societal ills : ` ` It makes
me realize how screwed up our society is. The welfare system actually encourages people
to stay on welfare ! The issue of poverty also compelled students to re ect on how
university students could best present themselves to the class : ` ` W hen tutors enter the
sites, they shouldn t aunt their wealth. D on t say you lost $300 last weekend gambling
when people can t pay their phone bills and rent.
W hile a number of tutors questioned how literacy learners had emerged from the
American educational system with minimal literacy skills, only a few student-tutors
expressed curiosity about how learners interacted with the larger political environment :
I tried to talk to some people about why they are or are not registered to vote.
N obody had any substantial reasons. Perhaps the argument that the legitimacy of
the government is in doubt when the majority of the people don t vote is
legitimate. Since there are no candidates who will substantially help or hurt the
majority of the people, who cares ? Only the issues like David D uke or abortion
galvanize the potential electorate. Then their interest is only transitory.
G enerally, it seemed easier for students to accept students from outside the U.S., when
it could be presumed that customs and world-views would be di erent from those of
mainstream Am erica. M ore challenging to understand or accept were the values and
practices of learners from racial, ethnic, or economic subcultures of the United States
that diverged from those of our predominantly white college students: ` ` It s all about
the American dream and how an immigrant comes to seek opportunity and gets it.
W ith American subcultures, students were generally respectful if distant from those who
belonged to cultures with which they were unfamiliar : ` ` I m learning about M ichele
and her personal life. N ot that her personal life is so important ; I m merely trying to
connect information about her and her reasons for pursuing her education. Cultural
di erences, including those related to class, were noted with mild curiosity ` ` W alter
hails from the W est Indies. I forgot to ask him whether he spoke French or not. I noticed
that most people who come from W .I. speak uent French or a studied objectivity :
R alph had been a [drug] user for 23 years. Erin [another tutor] was making
comments to him like, ` ` Oh, how could you ? That was so bad. But it s a fact, he s
very straightforward about it. N o soapbox for or against.
98
G ender issues for our mostly female tutors seemed present but tacit, lying beneath most
of their words but never made explicit in a way that we could pinpoint. Yet the fact that
most of our tutors were female re ects the strong pulse of gender that beat through our
tutors words : women are the caregivers, nurturers, and teachers (N oddings, 1984).
Issues around domestic abuse and pregnancy elicited the strongest reaction from
students, frequently one of shock :
She told me her leg hurt. I asked, why, and she said her boyfriend beat her up
because he didn t want a baby. I didn t know what to say, in fact I don t even
remember what I said now.
Another tutor at the same school described the follow-up to this incident, and o ered
assistance: ` ` she s not pregnant any more. Her mother kicked her out. She hinted at
living with me, but I avoided the issue. I wasn t sure what to say or do. I m going to look
into alternative housing for her.
D iscussion
As teachers and researchers, we embarked on this project wanting to expose students to
a myriad of adult literacy issues and to encourage them to re ect on the importance of
such issues to their daily lives. W e were motivated by a strong desire to learn from
students what issues they felt were most critical and how they perceived the many
personal and social aspects of literacy education. To summarize what we learned,
college student tutors in this study struggled to t in, to negotiate a helping relationship
when neither they nor their literacy learners knew exactly what to expect, and to teach.
They learned that the schools were not doing a good job in preparing all children for
some measure of success and that curricula that were ine ective on the primary and
secondary school levels were all too frequently imported to adult classrooms. They
learned rsthand about the e ects of social injustice and hypothesized about some of its
causes. Finally, they learned that societal changes were not initiated by one person
trying to convince another person to make a lifestyle change.
Success for the university student tutors in this project was clearly dependent upon
being useful to literacy learners and upon learners, in turn, being successful students of
reading, writing, and math. In their view, helping literacy learners to understand and
to advance to the next rung of the education ladder is the work of a good teacher in the
American school system. Ultimately, their views re ected those found in their
community placements rather than any alternative view that we promoted through our
purposefully wide-ranging, sometimes critical university course. Their understandings
represented the seemingly practical view that education is to be valued for its own sake.
Left unquestioned was whether the existing system was a vehicle for liberation or for
reproduction of the status quo.
Giroux (1992) speaks of an initial disjuncture between the hope o ered by
universities and the work that must be done to produce and transform knowledge in a
world fraught with asymmetrical power relationships. This asymmetry between the
producers and receivers of knowledge was re ected by the ` ` cold dose of reality
student-tutors experienced when they learned about the hard lives of their learners. W e
believe that our college student literacy tutors responded to this asymmetry by working
with their teachers, however unwittingly, to reinforce the dominant culture s educational paradigms (G rumet, 1988). The individually oriented work-ethic strategies
99
that tutors excavated from their own school backgrounds during seat-of-the-pants
decision making were those strategies that they perceived had allowed them access to
higher education and, ultimately, greater power and authority without realizing that
most of them had inherited their position in the hierarchy from their middle- and upperclass parents, and that the strategies that had seemed to work for them would perhaps
not work for others who did not share their inheritance. At the same time, college
student tutors were not uncritical of the system. Their questions did sometimes mirror
those of the critical pedagogue, exploring consistencies and contradictions in experience
with education (Brennan, 1987 ; Giroux, 1992 ; Kirk, 1986 ; Liston & Z eichner, 1987).
But while they complained about a society and class structure that allowed them to be
successful to others exclusion, they did not query their own participation, or our
participation, in its replication.
One signi cant feature of tutors experience was learning about new cultures. These
included American subcultures di erentiated by race, ethnicity, and class as represented
by students in basic education and G ED classes ; foreign cultures as represented by
students coming to English as Second Language classes ; and gender issues as manifested
by men and women of di erent ethnic backgrounds and social classes. These cultures
and identities represent the real material, in terms of life circumstances, power
dynamics, and institutions, that together form the borderlands, ` ` sites of crossing,
negotiation, translation, and dialogue (Giroux, 1994, p. 340). hooks (1994) talks
about how college students can go about acquiring knowledge concerning experiences
they have not lived. Surely working in a literacy education classroom is one means
toward an introduction to the lives of people from other cultures, based on race, class,
gender, or ethnicity ?
W hile we work to resolve those issues that are most pressing in daily life (our need
for literacy, an end to violence against women and children, women s health and
reproductive rights, sexual freedom, to name a few), we engage in a critical
process of theorizing that enables and empowers. (hooks, 1994, p. 70)
In our examination of student-tutors words, it was clear that a large part of their
development was focused on identity and relative position : discovering how they
learned best, negotiating an educational role with adult learners, identifying their
respective places in the world of educational ` ` haves and ` ` have-nots. The journals
also tell us of tutors awakening to inequities throughout the educational system, as they
a ect both children and adults, and society as a wh ole. A more radical education,
however, would extend beyond the awareness level to dialogue among all a ected
parties, then to action, and back again to dialogue, in a cycle of re ection and action.
Our college students, thus, helped us to understand that the border between campus life
and the adult literacy community is a site of reproduction rather than transformation,
at least as it was constructed in connection with this particular course. W hile our goal
to heighten their awareness of personal and cultural issues inherent in literacy struggles
was a lofty one, our students potential to imagine a more participatory world was likely
compromised by a position at the border that rei ed, at least in part, their ongoing
action as agents of the social structures that now exist.
The struggle of these college students hints at our own struggles as a society to
de ne a more productive literacy ; to achieve a greater, more accepting literacy for more
of our citizens ; to invite members of society to participate in the construction of a more
equitable society. College tutors have a unique voice : they are themselves students in a
university, yet they become teachers once they step into the literacy tutor role. They
100
have some freedom to shape this role, yet they are part of an established institution
within a larger societal discourse around literacy and education. Like those who they
worked with in adult basic education settings, the voices re ected in this study provide
little evidence that our course helped these particular students to see themselves as
future agents of social transformation. However, there are hints that they are moving
from an unwitting reproduction of the schooling hegemony to a more hopeful vision of
the dignity, knowledge, and empowerment of the adult learner. To do more, we must
return to our own pedagogy, nding ways to move its concerns from awareness and t
to something that requires a more transformative position. W e should nd a way to t
social action into our work with existing literacy programs, or we should nd alternative
programs that will provide a better model of what could be. Also, we should probably
examine the possibility that societal trajectories cannot be altered with literacy
education. Only in uncomfortable conversations that explore such connections between
the personal and the liberatory will we be able to understand these issues in a way that
ultimately fosters the more democratic society that we espouse.
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Liberation or reproduction : exploring meaning in

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Critical literacy and related concepts

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to political unity (G iroux, 1992 ; M ou e, 1988). It means moving beyond merely

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the use of a computer in literacy instruction, and the development of metacognitive

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Rewards of tutor ing

I love seeing a face light up when things are understood.

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