Reluctant Advocates: Write Letters

These letters got me thinking ‘How can we leverage the effectiveness of a letter in the world of adult literacy and learning?’ We don’t have to look far - CALP Portal e-Learnings - to find two trusted voices from the field and their ideas.

At the conclusion of the Building Literacy Guide Dr. Allan Quigley suggests that “If we are to be more visible, it is suggested literacy learners and our graduates, along with practitioners, could be the key to open the door for the changes we need.”

Literacy learners could tell their stories.

Likewise, learners and graduates could be encouraged to write their stories. Programs could make those stories available by printing and circulating them and/or post learner stories on their websites. Or run blog posts that circulate stories written by learners.

I was once involved in writing a monthly literacy blog to the literacy field in Saskatchewan, and I often included (with their permission) literacy learners’ stories as written by them—and their stories went across the province, and beyond. More than once, I was told by instructors and counsellors how the learner-authors gained a whole new sense of pride and confidence by being published. I was told how funding agencies circulated the stories among their agencies. Learners’ voices have power. (Source: Building Literacy Guide Section 7: Towards a Better Future)

And in the Never-Fail Writing Method e-Learning, Kate Nonesuch suggests letters to politicians as one way to Share Learners' Writing in the Larger Community. According to Kate one of the biggest benefits of writing to a politician is that “politicians nearly always answer (especially if you visit their office and deliver the letters in person)”.

These examples highlight the importance of giving voice. As Dr. Quigley observes “We have an amazing history. But did you notice that learners had no input? No voice?” Letters are one way to add learner voice to the field.

There is another, likely more important, result of sharing learner voice that is perfectly captured in the ProLiteracy Advocacy Toolkit. 

[H]elping adult learners advocate for AEL helps them to become better advocates for themselves, their families, and communities. They discover the power they have when they tell their story to a public official and that official listens—especially if leaders have not heard from them before, or if they never considered their experiences to be of value to policy makers. It improves their self-confidence and their ability to speak publicly and influence others, to convey ideas in writing, to collaborate, and to make a positive difference.

Letters are one way that adult Albertans with a foundational learning need can share their own stories, experiences and learning journeys. In their own words. Oftentimes the effectiveness of a letter writing campaign relies on the personalized messages within the letters. We read letters for the story. The details. The lived experience.

The Pro-Literacy Notebook outlines how to use a letter writing campaign to advocate for funding support and includes a template to follow. An effective advocacy letter includes:

•            a brief introduction 

   

•           a brief explanation of why they are taking the class 

   

•            how the school or class has helped them 

   

•            a brief statement of future plans 

   

•            stating at the end, “Please support funding for adult education.” 

   

Make it personal. Seems like the perfect time to circle back to the love letters sitting in my cousin’s basement, doesn’t it? When I was complaining that my cousin wouldn’t share the letters with any of the rest of us my dad piped up, "do you think your grandfather would want you to be reading those letters?" [long pause]

He has a point. There is a significant difference in writing letters for private versus public reading.

This is a role for CALP staff. Letter writing is an opportunity to educate learners on the power of their voice. For themselves, their families, their communities and more. In Writing Out Loud, Deborah Morgan explains:

All writers feel vulnerable when they write their thoughts and ideas on paper.  There they are, in black and white, for all the world to see.  People think that putting their thoughts on paper will leave them open to criticism.  That’s where the trust and comfort you’ve been working on comes in.  Writing from the heart can feel “risky” because it might take your student to a new level of awareness or understanding.  But that’s not something to be afraid of; its something to celebrate.

Writing a letter has all sorts of benefits. Letters help us heal, show our support, advocate, and tell our own stories in our own words. But perhaps the biggest benefit to a published letter? Confidence.

Both Deborah and Kate agree that before sharing learners’ writing publicly, we can and should help polish the writing. Here is how Kate frames it in the Never-Fail Writing Method:

When writing is shared with a larger circle than the writing group, there is an opportunity for revising that first draft and polishing it up. The larger audience and the fact of being published both provide motivation to edit and proofread, to move from a first draft to a final form.

Every published writer works with an editor. Learners whose work is being published also need an editor to make sure they look good in print. Practitioners can work one-to-one with learners to make the punctuation and spelling perfect, while not losing the wording and the voice of the original. It is the time for the practitioner to do the proofreading, not just encourage the learner to do it. 

And Deborah echoes that sentiment in Writing Out Loud:

Nothing gives writers more confidence than to have their words published.  Unfortunately, most people think that published work has to be “saleable”, ie. printed and sold.  A definition from the Webster’s Dictionary for the word “publish” that I particularly like is, “to put into circulation”.  There are many ways to have students’ writings put into circulation.  But first we have to talk about “polishing”.