Librarian: Jayne Klein

e-mail address: jayne@literacycouncilmcmd.org

Librarian’s Hours: Monday through Thursday, 11:00 AM to 5:00 PM. The library is available to tutors at any time during the LCMC’s regular office hours.

The LCMC Library provides tutors and their students with over 1,100 titles written for adults who are learning to read, write or speak English.  Topics include grammar, writing, spelling, citizenship, history and geography, and everyday living.  The library also has a large collection of resource materials, educational resources, and teaching materials.

We are always interested in what resources you are using with your students.  We would like to hear suggestions on additional materials that tutors would find helpful to add to our collection.

Below are Featured Resources and sample titles. 

Many of the resources listed below are are .pdf files.  You may need to download Adobe Reader in order to access them.  Click here to download free software (Be sure to select the software version for your operating system).

Skillbook Activity Sheets
Communicating With Your Childs School
Health
News for Students
Student Lines
Library Titles by Subject Matter
Library Titles by Reading Level
Tutor Collection Titles

Skill Book Activity Sheets:

Supplementary materials are important to include in your lessons.  Below are activity sheets you can use with your student.

Communicating With Your Child's School

We have a brand new program for you to use to help adult English language learners who have children in Montgomery County Public Schools.  Increased parent involvement will help children succeed in school, but many LCMC students come to us from cultures that discourage open communication with their childrens' teachers.  Lack of English language proficiency further dissuades them from becoming active participants in their children's education.

Available in hard copy at the LCMC library and below in .pdf format is a teaching tool for adult learners developed by Marilyn Block, longtime tutor, trainer, and LCMC board member.  There are three 90-minute instructional sessions on school-related vocabulary, written and verbal communication methods and meetings with school staff.

Communicating With Your Child's School Part IA
Communicating With Your Child’s School Part IB
Communicating With Your Child's School Part II
Communicating With Your Child's School Part III

Health

Our Laubach materials have lessons built around the topic of health at several levels.  Level One talks about calling the doctor.  We discuss burns and how to put out fires in Level Two  Several Student Lines discuss the common cold, cataracts and sleeplessness.  If you are looking for other resources containing health information at a low reading level, here are some helpful links:

www.askme3.org/for_patients.asp
www.fda.gov/opacom/lowlit/englow.html
Easy to Read Health Information

Check Ups are evaluations administered by the tutor at the end of each Skill Book level.  They are used to assess student progress and identify areas that may need to be reviewed in future lessons. 

While some of the Check Up information is detailed at the end of the Teacher's Manual, it is not complete.  There are additional documents you must have in order to perform the Check Up.  You can obtain them either by downloading the documents via the links below or contacting the LCMC office and requesting the Check Up materials (It will be sent to you via the library pony system.  Expect to receive it approximately 10 - 15 business days after your request).

Check Ups consist of three components--cover sheet,  booklet and teacher evaluation forms (scoring pages).  Click on the appropriate level to download the documents you need:

How to Administer a Check Up

As a tutor, you should periodically look at the Check Up materials during your lesson preparation to be sure you understand what items are considered to be priority knowledge and make sure your student is comfortable with these items.

When you approach the end of a Skill Book, take some time at each lesson to review a portion of the skills/materials that the student will be tested on in the Check Up.  Depending on how often you meet with your student, substantial time could have passed from when you first introduced the concepts in the Check Up.  Here is where note-taking at each tutoring session becomes invaluable.  You can review these notes to identify those areas where your student has struggled and take extra time to review.  Once you have reviewed all the material, you are ready to formally administer the Check Up.

In the back of each Teacher’s Manual are directions on how to administer the Check Up.  You use the Teacher’s Evaluation Form to score your student’s performance.  Scoring instructions are in your Teacher’s Manual.  Once you have completed each section of the Check Up, you evaluate your student’s performance.  Instructions for evaluating your student’s performance are also in your Teacher’s Manual.  Once your student has finished the Check Up, send the completed materials to your office coordinator.  The LCMC  will then send you a diploma which you will present to your student.

Note:  If your student has areas where they obviously struggled, you still move on to the next level.  You do not repeat a level with your student.  As you work in the next book, you will incorporate supplementary exercises that focus on the problem areas of the previous level to reinforce those skills.  If you need help creating these exercises, check out the Literacy Links page on our website (under Home) or call the office.  Sometimes exercises as simple as typing out the drill for a skill in the previous Skill Book and having your student complete the exercise can be used as a supplement. In addition, the Student Workbook from the previous level can help with structure focus.  If the student needs help with reading and writing, you can use Student Lines and More Stories from the previous level as reinforcement. 

News for Students are small articles that are written at a student's level and are an insert found in our Newsletter.  For those of you who may have misplaced your copies, here are links to the last several issues:

Listed below are titles of Student Lines that are available for you to download at your convenience.  We have also added Stories from Real Life.  These writings are created by tutors who incorporate vocabulary from the Laubach series into stories about real people and places.  Click on the title to access the story.

Skillbook 1 Level

A New School
Family

Stories from Real Life-Presidents Day

Stories from Real Life-The Potomac River Valley

Stories from Real Life-Number Words

Stories from Real Life-The Hills Go to Washington

Skillbook 2 Level

Handwork
Password

Stories from Real Life-Buildings in Washington

Skillbook 3 Level

Safe Swimming

Skillbook 4 Level

How to Help Your Child Learn to Read
Have trash?  Recycle!

Books on Grammar, Writing and Spelling

Capitalization and Punctuation
Checking Your Grammar
English Grammar on One Card
Focus on Phonics
How to Spell 1 - 4
Laubach Way to Cursive Writing
Listen First: Focused Listening Tasks for Beginners
Patterns in Spelling 1 - 4
A Prescriptive Spelling Program
Writing for Adult New Readers
Writing it Down
Write Your Own Letters

Books on Citizenship

Citizenship:  Passing the Test
Constitution Made Easy
Important Days in the U.S.A.
Star Spangled Banner
Voices of Freedom
Voting in America
Way to U.S. Citizenship
Welcome to the United States

Books on History/Geography

America's Story
Visit to China
Visit to Costa Rica
Visit to Mexico
Visit to Vietnam
Washington D.C.: What to See and Do
Reading Essentials Series
    America at War
    America in the 1700s
    The Ancient World
    Country Connections
    Governing the World
    Symbols of a Nation
    U.S. National Parks

Books on Everyday Living

What to Do Series
    When you are Having a Baby
    When your Child Gets Sick
    For Teen Health
    For Healthy Teeth
    For Senior Health
English for Work Activities
Exploring Job Skills
Sewing
Shopping
Studying for a Driver’s license
When a Baby is Brand New
You Can Give First Aid
You’re Hired

Level 1

Construction Workers
Farmers
Fire-fighters
Garbage Collectors
Nurses
Police Officers
Plumbers

Level 2

Susan B. Anthony
Ceasar Chavez
Benjamin Franklin
Abraham Lincoln
Harriet Tubman

Level 3

The Story of Anne Frank
Home Run Heroes
Abraham Lincoln

Level 4

16 Extraordinary Series:  African Americans, Hispanic Americans, Young Americans, Entrepreneurs

Resource Materials

Heinle Picture Dictionary
Oxford Picture Dictionary
Visual Dictionary
Webster’s Dictionary and Thesaurus

Educational Resources

Cultures in Contrast
Progress Profile: Measuring Progress in Literacy Development
Pronunciation Contrasts in English
Resource Books For Teachers: Listening
Taking the Mystique Out of Learning Disabilities
Teaching Adults: A Literacy Resource Book

Teaching Materials

Challenger 1 - 2
In the Know 1 - 4
Laubach Way to English 1 - 4
Laubach Way to Reading 1 - 4
Life Prints 1 - 4
Voyager: Reading and Writing for Today’s Adults 1 - 4