The Gauntlet is Thrown: A Health Literacy Instructor Challenge!

Fresh from the Health Literacy Department - One of the best ways to teach health literacy and patient empowerment in the ESL, ABE or GED classroom is to guide your learners through their development of a personal health journal. A few years ago we developed the Doctor's Visit Toolkit. Inside, we provided general tips to be an empowered patient and templates for learners to practice completing common forms they'll see in the healthcare setting. Together with learners, we work our way through the Doctor's Visit Toolkit and upon completion, we encourage learners to bring it with them as a reference tool the next time they go to the clinic or hospital.
 

Through mid-July, we're challenging our Central Texas instructors to take on the Doctor's Visit Toolkit with their learners. Use it as an ongoing project that learners work on over several weeks. Once you've completed the activity with your class, send us an email with a sample of the journal you've created. Literacy Coalition employees and advisers will choose the top three models and share them in our next quarterly newsletter (scheduled for release on July 15th). The creator of the top journal will also have a featured article in the newsletter (distribution to 1000+ people) and win a prize package valued over $50!

Much of what you might include in a health journal can be found on our Resources Page. Email Peter if you don't have the 1st Edition of the Health Literacy Instructional Manual yet (that will be a great resource to get you started!) or if you'd like some templates of medical forms that were used in the Doctor's Visit Toolkit.


Things you might include...just to get you started:

1. Medication schedule chart
2. Medical history form
3. Family history
4. Sample insurance form
5. List of key vocabulary for navigating hospital or doctor's office (e.g., information desk, emergency, pediatrics, physician, etc.)
6. AskMe3 and other recommended questions to ask the doctor or nurse
7. Patient-empowerment tips
8. And much more! Talk with your students about what they want to learn regarding health information and get creative!  

Good luck and don't hesitate to call or email Peter if you have questions or want some resources to get you started! 

 
 

5000 advertisements a day!

The first time I heard about media literacy I was in my 6^th grade English class and our teacher was having us cut up magazines to recreate the advertisements with our interpretation of what it was they were trying to convey or sell. I have to admit I didn’t really understand why he was having us do it, but hey, we were getting to look at magazines and make collages during school, so I wasn’t about to complain.  Media literacy completely fell off my radar until I got to high school and became interested in the use of advertising in political campaigns to make voters feel something about a particular candidate whether or not it was a true reflection of who the candidate was or what they stood for. This got me wondering how much advertising influenced the decisions people make on a daily basis and the way we form relationships with other people as well as with the inanimate objects promoted in advertisements.

I bet most of you are thinking, “Hey, I’m an intelligent, well-educated person. I know how to make rational decisions. Advertisements don’t really have any influence on me.” Maybe, but we are living in an era of media saturation – think about how much time you spend on Facebook or Twitter or Pinterest or email or surfing the net. Advertisements have become harder and harder to differentiate from other forms of media. Some estimate that we are exposed to close to 5000 advertising messages daily! So, whether or not you believe advertisements influence the decisions you make, it doesn’t hurt to buff up your media literacy skills so that you can be both a critical thinker and creative producer of media.

So what exactly is media literacy? Essentially it is a communication skill set that enables a person to access, analyze, evaluate, and communicate information in a variety of forms (this includes both print and non-print media). It is not an anti-media movement but rather a movement to empower individuals as we make choices as students, citizens, workers, consumers, and (to tie this back to my role as Health Literacy Intern) as patients. One day there’s an article on how ________ food that is good for you and the next day there’s a new article about how it may cause _______.  One day low-fat diets are touted as the best prescription for weight loss and the next it’s low-carb diets. How am I supposed to figure out healthy eating with all the mixed messages? And all those advertisements for drugs that are supposed to help with anxiety, restless leg syndrome, insomnia, PMS.  How can I figure out if one is right for me? What if my doctor doesn’t prescribe the one I’ve seen on TV? Should I ask for a different prescription? Or for those of us who like to self-diagnose our symptoms, which websites are actually providing trustworthy information and how do I know whether I’ve just got bad allergies or a brain tumor when swollen, stinging, draining eye is a symptom of both? That’s where media literacy can help. It doesn’t have all the answers, but it will help us to think more critically about the messages we receive, question the source of the information and the motivation behind the message.

Interested in learning more about media literacy, check out some of my favorite media literacy advocates: Media Education Foundation,  Sut Jhally, Jean Kilbourne, Jackson Katz, the National Association for Media Literacy Education, Center for Science in the Public Interest.

In the adult literacy classroom you can help your students improve their media literacy by creating activities and discussions comparing advertisements and public health announcements. You can check out more in our Health Literacy Workshops for Literacy Instructors.

"I Stand for Literacy"

I STAND FOR LITERACY! This was the battle cry at the United States Conference on Adult Literacy last week. It was a great conference, one in which over 600 instructors, advocates, learners, program managers, and more came together to learn, share new ideas, inspire one another, and push the field of adult literacy ahead. It was inspiring to meet so many passionate individuals, fighters for this great cause!

During the opening ceremony, the conference host, ProLiteracy, asked audience members to share their stories. To share why each one of us stands for literacy. We heard some inspiring stories, some heartbreakingly sad, and some that just seemed obvious. That's where I think my reason for "standing for literacy" fits in, in the obvious category.

A mother's literacy level is the number one predictor of her child's success in school. An individual's health literacy level is the STRONGEST predictor of a person's health status. Twenty percent of the Central Texas population is reading below the 5th grade reading level! It's so obvious why we all need to stand for literacy. Literacy is the best avenue to a healthy, employable, empowered community!

So tell us, why do you stand for literacy? Share your stories with us here, and check out the ProLiteracy website to share your story with them, too!

I Stand for Literacy!

You can also hear other people's stories HERE

What is Family Literacy?

By Erica Schmidt, MSSW Intern

A mother’s literacy level is one of the most significant predictors of a child’s future success in school, and family literacy is one service that works to overcome that reality and increases literacy rates throughout Central Texas. Many family literacy programs exist throughout Central Texas, and the Literacy Coalition is working to gain a better understanding of them one-by-one.

A pre-analysis of seven of the larger LCCT family literacy providers revealed that these organizations strongly believe there is great need for program support in Central Texas. For that reason, we have been conducting a needs assessment with all family literacy providers over the past weeks.

Some of what we are looking at includes populations served, program content, best practices, availability of resources, challenges, as well as establishing a standard definition of family literacy through our five-county area. We are also curious to hear about the interest of providers to participate in the expansion of literacy services in Central Texas. All of this is important for providers and us to know as we build community capacities to ensure the success of family literacy programs.

So what is family literacy exactly? Family literacy programs are most effective when they deliver services through a holistic approach that empowers families by educating the children and parents together. Family literacy fosters an ability and readiness of families to interact with printed materials of any kind. The hope is that families not only feel confident in their literacy ability but that they promote it throughout their children’s lives.