How to Teach Adults to Read and Write

The foundation of any education is the ability to read and write. Unfortunately, many adults lack basic skills in these areas. Teaching an adult to read and write can be difficult but highly rewarding; giving someone vital skills is much like giving them a new life. Follow these simple step-by-step instructions to teach an adult to read and write quickly and effectively.

Instructions

Teaching an Adult to Read and Write

1

Ascertain the skill level of the adult you are trying to teach. This can be difficult because many adults are extremely self-conscious about their poor reading or writing skills. Always be encouraging and never judgmental. An adult struggling to read or write probably thinks that he or she is stupid. There is a good chance that the adult already knows how to read much more than a young child does who is just starting.

2

Make sure that your student knows and can write all the letters of the alphabet. The best plan is to teach him to read while teaching him to write. Teach basic words that the student already understands and that are found in common reading materials, such as a newspaper. Sounding out the words is less important than recognizing them.

3

Do not start the process with juvenile reading materials such as a first reader. This will only make the student feel stupid, as if he can only understand a low level of material. Have the student sound out a line from a newspaper and then copy it down in writing. With this combination of reading and writing, the student can master both skills quickly.

4

Teach a reading lesson first and then a writing lesson. For an adult, writing will mostly just be a matter of copying letters and words, the meaning of which is already known. If the student can read the word and understand its meaning he will learn to write it quickly.

5

Encourage the student but never in a patronizing way. When he makes phonetic mistakes, correct him and then quickly move to a new activity. Read out loud with the student so that he learns the natural rhythm of a line. Work with flash cards to increase the speed at which he recognizes words. Work on the level of basic sentences for a couple of months and then move on to more complicated material.