Learning Notes for XXX Date
Address:
Birthdate:
Home phone: It is okay to say you are a Your Program tutor.
E-mail:
(Please contact your learner within 72 hours of receiving this packet—let Program Coordinators know if you are unable to make contact for any reason)
Living situation:
Interests:
morning
Mon afternoon evening
Tues Wed Thurs Fri Sat Sun
(Remember the library is closed on Sundays during the summer.)
Transportation:
Employment:
Education:
Learning Styles/Observations
Give as much info as you can from the assessment.
Use a combination of visual, auditory and kinesthetic strategies. Together the two of you will find what works best as you get to know your learner better.
Measuring progress
It will be important to go over your learner’s goals together and set some short-term goals. Filling out the Monthly Update together is a good way to track progress and encourage your learner to take responsibility for defining the next set of goals.
Goals: See attached Goals Form.
Current Reading Skills: (delete other two levels along with their corresponding sections under
"advice on lesson planning")

• beginning reader
• intermediate reader
• advanced reader
Current Writing Skills:
(See writing sample, attached if supplied )
LITSTART strategies to use (feel free to add others as they seem appropriate)
Beginning Level
Word Study
26: Personal Phonics Cards
27: What Do You Hear?
28: Sound It Out
29: Cover It Up
30: Word Family Patterns:
36: Spelling Prep
Reading
17: Tutor Rewrite
18: Experience Story
21: Read Aloud
Writing
Page 173: Penmanship
50: Temporary Spelling
52: Written Conversation
53: Guided Writing (Beginning)
56: Assisted Writing
Intermediate Level
Word Study
27: What Do You Hear?
28: Sound It Out
29: Cover It Up
30: Word Family Patterns
32: Nonsense Words
37: Spelling Patterns 1
39: Copy Cat
Reading
14: Pre-Reading Survey
16: Let’s Find Out (aka KWL)
18: Language Experience Story
21: Read Aloud
22: Questioning

Writing
50: Temporary Spelling
51: Everyday Scenarios
52: Written Conversation
54: Guided Writing (Int./Adv.)
56: Assisted Writing
57: Writing 1, 2, 3
58: Journal Writing
59: Free Writing
Advanced Level
Word Study
29: Cover It Up
38: Spelling Patterns 2
39: Copy Cat
42: Spelling Tricks
Reading
14: Pre-Reading Survey
16: Let’s Find Out (aka KWL)
21: Read Aloud
22: Questioning
24: Story Outline
Writing
52: Written Conversation
54: Guided Writing (Int./Adv.)
56: Assisted Writing
57: Writing 1, 2, 3
58: Journal Writing
59: Free Writing
60: Process Writing
(You and your learner can decide what works best)
Reading:
Choose readings together. Some ideas....
Poetry
Song lyrics (listening to song or watching video)
LEAs!!!!!!!!!!!
Plan to write LEA’s onto flashcards, reassemble them, play matching games, etc.
Do lots of practice on how to activate prior knowledge: work on remembering to read, think about and talk about titles of passages so that PK can be activated.
Webbing, Mapping
Brainstorming
Talking about a picture before reading
Talking about a title before reading
Making a list of what you want to learn from a reading

Making a list of what you learned from a reading
Talk about if it would be helpful to practice reading instructions and following them together (Adult
Ed homework assignments, assembling something, doing a housework task, etc.)
Other possible reading materials to use:
Reader’s Digest stories.
Newspapers (News For You, see copies on the tutor resources shelves)
Bank statements, other consumer documents (tutor or learner could bring own)
Writing
Webbing: Try different varieties, starting with tutor taking dictation to write the web.
Try choosing a topic together, then each writing a web about it.
You don’t even have to turn the web into sentences every time.
Try out written conversation. In the long run, this may prove a very important and useful (and fun!) strategy.
Journaling: Each keep a daily journal and share each week. Generally, a journal is a place for thoughts, but not editing perfection, so accuracy in spelling/sentence formation is not important. It can create writer’s block to go back & “fix” spelling later, so it’s often best to just leave a journal alone. The tutor or learner can make notes about spelling words that come up in the journal, and work on them separately. To start, just journal a couple of words each week.
The tutor should journal too, then share. For a beginner, a journal can just be one word a week or one word a night, and the tutor should mirror this.
Experiment with word games that involve writing, especially those that help practice sight words or word families.
Together, write documents that the learner needs in order to communicate with care providers, such as doctors and home health aides. Medication lists, chore schedules, etc.
Fill out the Monthly Update each month with your learner, and drop it off in the Your Program mailbox. You can also e-mail the information to email@yourlibrary.org
or fax the Monthly
Update with Your Library's name on it to 734-555-1234 , the library’s fax number. You can find forms on our Tutor Resources shelves and on our website at www.yourlibrary.org/literacyurl
Word Study (“Keys”)
Sight words:
Practice sight words through reading, flashcards, cloze exercises.
Make a list of words that don’t follow regular phonics and spelling rules that need to be memorized by sight, as they come up.
Maybe sketch picture associations with each of these words.
Word families:
Work a lot with word families, because it’s an efficient way to get at single-letter phonics too.
If the learner is interested, write rhyming poems together using word families.
Phonics:
It may be helpful to work with big flashcards, assembling letters into words. Flashcards may also be helpful for breaking down words that come up in writing (visualize the chunking and sounding them out.) The flipping phonics chart sold by New Readers Press (or one you create from spiral bound index cards) is often a helpful tool.

Keys in general:
Chunk words into syllables, spell words out, talk about words, find small words in the bigger words, skip over words & guess them from meaning, think about similar words, etc. See what combination of keys strategies works best.
Spelling:
If the learner likes it, use written conversation as part of choosing what words to work on.
Be sure to incorporate writing and spelling in your work on reading word families.
There are a number of spelling workbooks available at the library if you two decide to use a workbook for this kind of thing.
Use boggle cubes or Scrabble tiles to work on word families, the effect of a silent “e”, blends, etc.
Other Suggestions
Keep a log of books read or words learned each month.
Keep a notebook of everything you have written and read together. Look back at it over time and make notes about where you both see progress.
Set at least one attainable goal each month. You may also want to set weekly goals. Together, track accomplishment of goals and what was learned on a chart in the notebook.
Have fun, and keep talking about what your learner’s priorities are and what is working best.
Last, but not least, keep in touch -- call or email staff, send in monthly updates. Remember, we need to hear from you. . .