What is the project about?
Nations Learning Together is a blog created by the adult literacy students of the Lifeline to Literacy program in the Centre for Excellence in Foundational Learning at Bow Valley College in Calgary, Alberta. The Lifeline to Literacy is a student-driven and open-curriculum program for adult learners who are upgrading skills such as reading and writing. The learners determine what they want to learn as well as how to learn it. The program widens the learners’ understanding of literacy by incorporating arts field trips to see film, theatre, and dance. The approach encourages learners to voice their ideas and opinions and relate classroom learning to everyday experiences.
The Nations Learning Together blog serves as a platform for students from adult literacy programs to share their ideas and their work with the on-line community. Students are encouraged to participate by sharing artwork, stories, poetry, photography, drawings, essays, videos, or audio pieces.
What is the goal?
The purpose of the blog is to showcase creative writing and art by students. They used a democratic decision-making model to develop the blog. Students were highly involved in determining what would go on the blog and how their program was to be described. Through creativity and self-assessment of their own work, students in literacy and upgrading programs are practising their democratic rights in education and deciding how they want to showcase their learning.
What can this project contribute to the adult literacy and essential skills field?
According to Lisa Fajardo, a former blog developer in the program,
“Learning about creating a blog seemed to provide students with some new insight on the versatility of the web and ways they could potentially share and use on-line spaces.”
Adult Literacy and Essential Skills Research Institute 