With the theme of “Sharing and Supporting Ideas
on Adult Learning in Our Community”, the conference aimed to provide a venue
where the experiences and ideas of participants could be shared, discussed, and
expanded upon. The conference also hoped to create a unique opportunity
where fellow volunteers and educators could connect with colleagues beyond their
own organizations. Finally, the conference aimed to highlight how “literacy” in
the Downtown Eastside community goes far beyond reading and writing; rather,
literacy means being able to enjoy and participate in everyday life. This
might include knowing how to prepare a home-cooked meal, browse the internet,
play the guitar, budget finances, or speak in your traditional or additional language
with others.
The KernelThe idea for the conference arose out of feedback from the professional development workshop series hosted by the DTES Adult Literacy Roundtable during the winter and spring of 2012. The suggestion for a volunteer tutor conference, where the discussions and presentations were led by community members, spoke directly to the over-arching goals of the Roundtable: to strengthen literacy in the DTES community by working together and through self-determination (see “A Plan for Strengthening Literacy in the Downtown Eastside Community” under 'Resources' on this website).
Continuing her reflection on the impact of the steering committee, Angelika explained: “ I have a background in organizing academic conferences at UBC, and so I was using some terms that were very academic, and committee members said to me “this or that doesn’t make sense.” We also decided we weren’t going to have any powerpoint presentations or projectors in the small group discussion rooms, because we wanted to make it accessible and unintimidating so that whoever wanted to participate could. The format of the different sessions - to have 10 minutes of story-sharing by the leader about their experience, followed by discussion questions - also came out of the steering committee. When we sent out the call for leaders of the small group discussion sessions, we got responses not just from volunteers but also educators working in the community who wanted to participate. So then we had a variety of different people leading the discussions.”
 |
Members of the DTES Volunteer Tutor/Facilitator Steering
Committee: (L to R) Raymond Jang, Miguel Aguilar,
Angelika Sellick, Barbara Lehan and Patricia Pellerin.
|
Margot Leigh
Butler and Kelsey Croft from the Humanities 101 Community Programme were
participants at the conference. Below is their description of some of the sessions
they attended.
On the day of the conference, Kwakwaka’wakw Elder Kelvin Bee from the Aboriginal
Front Door Society, honoured us by welcoming us to this unceded Aboriginal
land. He offered this image for the conference: “If you have nothing good to
say, take the cotton out of your ears and put it in your mouth.” In other
words, listen first before you speak.
Kelvin Bee also spoke to a group of conference participants about the
10,000 year old Kwak'wala language, and how to understand First Nations ways of
learning in city life. By explaining the Kwak’wala translations of some words
common to the city – for example, ‘city’ as sparkly
lights, ‘bus’ as big canoe, ‘building’ as a
big space, ‘police’ as watchmen-
he showed how the meaning of words changes through speakers’ interactions in
specific contexts. Kelvin shared how he has watched different cultures come
into his community, bringing other languages, and, through residential schools,
taking his language away. Today there are 180 fluent speakers of Kwak’wala, and
the language is being revitalized as younger people are picking it up.
“Working with Senior Learners” was led by Lucy Alderson from the Carnegie Learning Centre. Because the definition of ‘senior’ is pretty flexible, we learned that it’s important to pay attention to the needs of the individuals in the group, since everyone will be somewhere different in their life experience and physical needs. For all senior learners though, linking lessons to personal experiences, doing lots of stretching, and making learning FUN are all key!
There’s lots of theatre and learning in the DTES, and the small group
discussion called “Theatre and Learning” with Adrienne MacAllum (Carnegie Learning
Centre) really brought them together. The conversation started with the play
Adrienne wrote for the Learning Centre Christmas party, a dramatic comedy about
the loss and return of Learning Centre funding, starring staff, volunteers and
learners. In the small-group discussion,
we talked about how all cultures have performance traditions that can be drawn
on for learning, and theatre is a great way to bring people together to
collectively ‘grow’ each others’ ideas. For example, the DTES’s popular Moving
Theatre involves many local people every year. The very best way to learn about
theatre is to get yourself involved in a play!
Another small group discussion was called “Identifying Strengths in
Learners”, but more than that it was about helping learners identify their own
strengths. Our group leader Briony Taylor (Frontier College) found that on
resumes, many immigrant women she works with undersold their strengths and
didn’t want to talk about themselves positively. By taking part in activities
that highlighted strengths rather than weaknesses, such as ‘interview speed
dating’, the women recognized their own skills, as well as telling their
friends what they were good at.
“Volunteering in the DTES Community” was a small group discussion led
by April Smith and Hendrik Buene (AHA Media, At Home/Chez Soi, PHS, W2). They
focused on the importance of volunteering to the Downtown Eastside, and on how
many different ways there are to get involved in the community. For example, Hendrick
was invited to speak in Vienna and Geneva about his volunteer work on a
documentary about the DTES.
In the “Determination of Learners to Overcome Challenges” small group
discussion, Patricia Pellerin (newSTART Bridging Employment Program) told us a
success story about a woman who was so determined to get her math GED that she
had taken the exam 7 times. As a volunteer tutor, Patricia found that these
methods helped her to eventually pass: rephrasing the problem in her own words,
looking for clues as if she was a detective, working for shorter periods, and creating
a learning mantra: “The answer is in the
question” (not only applicable to math, but also one’s own questions in life!).
The other exciting concurrent small group discussions at the conference were:
“Contributing
Through Computers: Practical Ways to Tackle the Digital Divide” with Mark
Smith
(UBC Learning Exchange)
“Why do you want to learn English?” with Paul Crombie (DTES ESL Tutor)
“Tutoring Math” with Jo Lemay (Vancouver Community College).
“Skills and Resources for Strengthening Community Health” with Bambi Tait and William Booth (AIDS Vancouver and SFU Literacy Lives Project)
“Ideas for Practicing Pronunciation” with Carson Du (UBC Learning Exchange)
“Volunteers Creating a New DTES Literacy Resource Guide” with Miguel Aguilar and Raymond Jang (UBC Learning Exchange and VSB Downtown Eastside Education Centre)
“Back to Basics: Resources for Learning On-Line” with Dionne Pelan (UBC Learning Exchange) “Partnering Health and Learning” with Karri Kesslar (The Patients Voices Network)
“Working with Beginner ESL Learners” with Barbara Lehan (Carnegie Learning Centre)
At the closing, Elder Kelvin Bee reflected that participants had shown that they were able to take the cotton out of their ears, put it in their laps and listen and speak with honour.
~Written by Margot Leigh Bulter & Kelsey Croft in collaboration with Angelika Sellick
