One of the biggest issues for ESL learners can be the inability to understand critical information during important situations, such as when seeking medical attention. Ask Me 3™ is an educational program provided by the Partnership for Clear Health Communication at the National Patient Safety Foundation™ whose goal it is to make it easier for patients to understand their medical situation. As part of this program, their web site provides a free, two page brochure available in six languages that helps patients get the answers they need when they are meeting with their doctor or nurse, preparing for a medical procedure, or getting medicine.
Click on the following link to visit their site and print these brochures for your students: http://www.npsf.org/askme3/pdfs.php
As we were browsing for books on ESL, we thought it would be great to share with our tutors what we had found. There is a section called “Books” under “Tutors” that we added a little while ago.
We haven’t been able to read many of the books so we haven’t posted reviews, but we do have links to Amazon where you can see what other readers thought. If you do happen to purchase any of the books or have read any already, drop us a line and let us know what you think of them. It will help us have the most relevant selection available.
As a side note, if you purchase one of these books by clicking on a link from our Books page, a small portion of the purchase will come back to LVG and be put towards the great work that we do.
Enjoy!
On June 12, 2009, television stations in the United States changed to digital broadcasting. If your students have cable or satellite television, they shouldn’t have noticed any change. However, if your students use an antenna and their television was bought more than a year ago, they would have found that they no longer have access to television and instead get a blue screen with a phone number listed. (more…)
With the recent events regarding swine flu, you may want to discuss the issue with your students to make sure that they are aware of and understand this ever changing situation. Misinformation could lead to panic or inaction – both of which pose a danger to your students. We have found two good articles (one with extended activities) to help you present information in a comprehensible way. (more…)
Real Tutors, Real Learners is a fantastic series of videos created by Literacy DuPage, a ProLiteracy Affiliate in Illinois. As the name suggests, the videos show real tutors teaching real students and demonstrate many techniques similar to what you learned during your Tutor Training.
Ever wondered what other people are doing in their lessons? How do other tutors sound? How do other tutors start their classes? What do they talk about with their students? Each of these videos is a great opportunity to be a fly on the wall during another tutor’s lesson. (more…)
At last weeks’ Tutor Training, we heard from a number of wonderful speakers about their experiences teaching ESL as an LVG volunteer. One of our speakers, Ann Vallombroso, has given us a summary of her talk so that we could share it with the rest of our tutors.
Below is her outline which is full of great tips, insights, and likely, alot of comfort for those navigating the new frontier of ESL. (more…)
As a literacy group, we’re not in the habit of discussing the tax code, but in this case we have found some interesting information that we’d like to pass along. As always, check with a tax professional before taking tax advice from any source, including us.
According to the 2007 Instructions for Schedules A & B (Form 1040), deductible contributions
“can be in cash, property, or out-of-pocket expenses you paid to do volunteer work for the kinds of organizations described earlier. If you drove to and from the volunteer work, you can take the actual cost of gas and oil or 14 cents a mile. Add parking and tolls to the amount you claim under either method. But do not deduct any amounts that were repaid to you.”
This means that you can potentially deduct the mileage for your travels to and from your tutoring sessions. With today’s gas prices, we can all use any help we can get.
There are some caveats, however. When considering making a deduction of this nature, there are special considerations, such as whether you received a benefit from this contribution. There also may be further documentation needed if this gift (your travel for us) is of $250 or more. You should consult your tax professional about how these specific items may be applicable to you. To read the details from for yourself, you can click here to open a PDF of the instructions for schedules A and B quoted above.
(NOTE: This link is no longer available)
The current mileage rate for volunteers is $0.14 per mile. A bit paltry when you consider that “As of July 1, if you drive for business, you can deduct 58.5 cents per mile, up from 50.5 cents per mile. Folks who drive to and from medical providers, or move for a job, can deduct 27 cents per mile, up from 19 cents.”
Thankfully, the very same month, a new bill was introduced in Congress to increase the mileage deduction for volunteers. Clearly we’re not the only ones that think volunteers deserve more to offset the expense of today’s gas prices.
For more details about making this deduction, including options for calculating the deduction and the correct way to keep records, read this concise article found on Suite101.com.
Pearson Longman, the publisher of our texts, has a podcast section on their web site that offers free podcasts (short audio clips about specific topics) from the authors of many of their texts—including the authors of the books we use.
The easiest way to listen to these podcasts is to use iTunes, but iTunes is not required. You can use any music player that plays MP3s. You also don’t need an iPod. You can listen to these files on your computer or you can burn these files to an audio CD and take them into your car.
To get to the Pearson Longman podcasts, go to www.pearsonlongmanusa.com/podcasts. You’ll see a long list of podcasts with a title and author. Next to each of these is a button that says “iTunes” and one that says “Download”. The easiest way to get the podcast onto your computer is to have iTunes installed and click on the iTunes button.
There are a lot of interesting podcasts in this list including ones on topics such as “Secrets My Applied Linguist Told Me”, “The Multilevel Classroom”, “The Importance of Warmups:Why Do Warmups?”, and many, many more. All of the podcasts are free and range in length from 4 to 16 minutes or so.
What a great way to make use of your time sitting in traffic!
Other Reasources: