Outside the Classroom: Researching Literacy with Adult Learners

There is a large body of research that shows literacy is a matter of context and social relationships - rather than a skills-deficient model of inadequacy and lack. Drawing on this research, "Outside the classroom" explores how, by using the social practice view of literacy, teachers and policy makers can look beyond the skills focus of the classroom to see something of the networks and environments in which learners operate. Expounding the links between theory and practice, the authors set out both the key concepts central to the social practice view of literacy and the crucial aspects of teaching practice. Each is illustrated by a related group of portraits, researched and written by teachers of adult literacy in partnership with learners, offering a rich and varied collage of literacy lives. The authors bring these together in the concluding section, signalling further directions for teaching and research. For anyone interested in the social realities of reading and writing, this is an invaluable resource for professional development, participatory research and teaching practice in adult literacy education.