This report is a follow up to the report which Education for Development produced for ODA (now DFID) in 1994, a shortened version of which was published under the title Using Literacy: a new approach to post-literacy materials (ODA 1994).
The first report was aimed primarily at literacy practitioners in developing societies, and was intended to be practical, suggesting some of the ways in which post-literacy programmes (and initial literacy teaching programmes) could become more effective. It drew upon the insights into literacy as social practice which are being developed under the title of the New Literacy Studies (Street 1993 pp. 4-12).
The aim of this second report is to conceptualise the field of post-literacy. It provides an examination of the most common current approaches in a number of developing countries, looking at the strengths and weaknesses of these approaches. This is followed by an outline of some of the emerging new approaches to literacy teaching and an analysis of a number of problems which have arisen in the course of attempts to implement them. The report ends with a discussion of some of the policy implications of this analysis, an action plan, and suggestions for further research.
This report thus does not replace the earlier report. Indeed, it draws upon and refers to material contained in that report. It does not for instance include examples of materials for post-literacy programmes, since they are adequately represented and illustrated in that publication. Rather, it extends and expands on it, providing the under-pinning logic-frame which justifies the programme of action which that report advocated.
The nature of post-literacy: The origin of this research project helps to dictate its parameters. It commenced as an examination of those programmes which follow immediately after the teaching of adult basic literacy skills, and which seek to produce special reading materials for 'neo-literates', for which funding is often requested from donors.
But the term 'post-literacy' is currently used in developing countries in two main senses -
a) to refer to a short-term and distinct stage of literacy provision which follows more or less immediately after the adult basic literacy teaching;b) to refer to all those longer-term educational programmes (usually called 'continuing education') or those other activities (such as income generating groups) which follow after the teaching of literacy skills has been completed, i.e. everything that follows the adult literacy teaching programme.
Namibia is an example of this ambiguity. The National Guidelines of 1997 outline three years of study in the basic adult literacy programme, each with their own primers. Post-literacy is seen to commence after Stage 3 of the literacy programme, and it consists of a planned curriculum equivalent to Grades 5 to 7 of formal primary school, open to the graduates from the first three stages of the adult literacy programme and to those who have completed Grade 4 of primary school - in other words, what elsewhere is called 'continuing education' (Namibia 1997 pp27-28). But more recently, Stage 3 of the basic literacy course is spoken of as 'post-literacy', and the next stage is now being called 'Adult Upper Primary Education Programme' (field notes, 1998).
What we are seeking to address here when we talk about 'post-literacy' is the first of these two definitions of post-literacy - that short-term programme of literacy teaching which immediately follows after the teaching of basic literacy skills and aimed at those adults who have developed some literacy skills and confidence but need further help. We are not discussing the wider field of lifelong continuing education, for this needs its own detailed examination which would be too wide to address here. Most countries in the developing world have a stage of literacy provision at the end of the basic programme, and this is the subject of this report.
A new approach to post-literacy: Our survey did not confine itself to post-literacy materials, although much of our time was spent looking at the special reading materials produced in post-literacy programmes. For such an examination provoked the questions as to whom these materials are intended for, what their purpose is, how appropriate they are for their intended readership, and what their relationship is to the initial literacy teaching programme. Our discussion therefore ranges widely over the whole field of post-literacy - what it is, what purposes it serves, and how those purposes may best be fulfilled.
Both of our reports seek to promote a new approach to post-literacy (which will also affect initial literacy teaching). However, we are anxious not to promote any new orthodoxy but to invite those involved in the field to engage in a new debate. What we outline here is a set of principles which each country, and each provider within each country, can use to build a post-literacy programme appropriate to their own situation. We seek to promote situated post-literacy, responsive to local conditions, rather than a uniform approach or methodology used universally.
Method of working: As with the earlier report, Education for Development proceeded by setting up a research team consisting of Professor Alan Rogers as convenor, Deryn Holland, Bryan Maddox, Juliet Millican, Dr Katy Newell Jones, Uta Papen, Dr Anna Robinson-Pant (who participated by e-mail from Nepal) and Professor Brian Street. We re-surveyed the literature on post-literacy with particular reference to material published since 1993. We commissioned a series of papers relating to post-literacy in Asia, Botswana, Kenya, Latin America, Nepal and Nigeria (see Appendix; these papers are available for consultation and most of them will be published in some form). We were able to draw upon experience gained from visits made by members of the team to Bangladesh, Kenya, Botswana, South Africa and Namibia. A study visit to India specifically to examine post-literacy in relation to the Total Literacy Campaign was made. The team met on seven occasions (including a two-day session). The report has been drafted from these discussions and reviewed by all team members.
We are conscious that the range of material available to us comes mainly from policy-makers and literacy training providers and reflects their discourse. The aims of these agencies and the discourses in which these aims are set out are often very different from those of field workers and of participants in literacy training programmes (Hobart 1993 p12). We have included some comments from a small number of field workers and participants, but we have not been able to survey these in any depth within the time and resources available for this study. We recommend that a more thorough survey be undertaken to ensure that the voices of field workers and literacy learners in different countries are heard in this debate.
We ourselves have employed the discourse of the planners and policy makers, for it was they who commissioned and who will receive this report. It is then directed primarily at policy-makers. But we are aware that a wide range of readers, including practitioners, will read it. We hope that all those who wish to inform themselves more deeply and prepare for a post-literacy programme which is fully integrated within a thoroughly planned literacy and basic education programme will find it useful. We have sought to reflect and to some extent address the concerns of those many people we met who see problems with current practices and are struggling to develop new approaches which have the promise of being more effective. We are clear that what we propose has important implications for initial literacy teaching programmes, and we examine some of these implications during our discussions.
It remains for us to thank all those who have assisted with the preparation and production of this report. We particularly wish to thank Deryn Holland and Brian Street, members of the research team who commented on drafts throughout the project and offered continuing assistance, but who because of other commitments were unable to join in the final stage of writing the report. In addition, Professor Michael Omolewa, J.D. Thompson, Rosa Maria Torres, Dr Avik Ghosh, Dr A Mathew, Dr Anita Dighe, Dr Tonic Maruatona, Mrs Marty Legwaila, and the staff of ACCU wrote papers specially for us or made papers available to us. Others answered our queries, often at short notice, and facilitated our visits or access to materials. We have enjoyed much correspondence in relation to this theme, including with Dr Jane Freeland, Dr Marilyn Martin-Jones, Dr Izabel Magalhaes, Dr Angela Kleiman and Dona Williams. We have benefited from the comments which Edwin Townsend Coles made on an early draft of this report. The team is grateful to Dr Roy Williams who joined Education for Development as its Executive Director at a late stage in our discussions. He showed great interest in the project, joined one of the main sessions and commented on a draft of the report. But while this report reflects the views expressed to us, it remains our own production, and we alone are responsible for the statements made in it.
Alan Rogers (on behalf of the drafting team)
July 1998
