Professional Development to Work With Low-Educated Adult ESL Learners: Searching Beyond the Program
Abstract
After following career interests that included anthropology and the visual arts, the author realized that working with adult immigrants with limited formal education and literacy skills was her path and her passion. Since few programs in the TESOL field focused on these learners, the author sought out instruction in nontraditional spaces to supplement her master’s course work with the specific training she desired. She views graduate school as an opportunity to explore fundamental questions about what skill set is essential to effectively teach this population, and in this article she shares her insight, resources, and suggestions for how graduate students can take further agency over their own education and how TESOL teacher training might be more inclusive.