If you're not already a crossword puzzle aficionado, perhaps it's time to be (especially after our rainiest fall on record)! Dec 21st is national crossword puzzle day, so if you're up for a new hobby, it's a great way to keep your brain sharp and, as many of our instructors and students will tell you, it can also be a great tool in learning a new language! Here are some ideas for how to incorporate crosswords into your life.

Welcome Note

Dear Literacy Source Community, The winter holidays are a time for celebration and reflection. We celebrate friends and family, the year's challenges and accomplishments, and we think about ways that we can make the world a better place. At Literacy Source, we see reasons to celebrate in our students, who, amidst innumerable barriers, dedicated nearly fifty thousand hours this academic year to gaining the skills and education to create new opportunities for themselves, their families, and the community. We celebrate our amazing volunteers, who donated over 8,000 hours to partner with our students in order to create a stronger and more equitable community. As well, we celebrate our incredible staff, who take seemingly endless curve balls and continue to provide personalized, innovative, and high-class instruction to our students, ensuring that we meet them where they are and continue to respond to their needs. The holidays are also a time for reflection, and for those who may not celebrate Christmas, who have lost loved ones, or who struggle with mental health challenges, they may experience the holidays differently. What sounds like cheerful music and a celebratory atmosphere may be a reminder of feeling lonely or like an outsider. One thing we admire about the Literacy Source community is your willingness to see things from different perspectives. Our joint commitment to lifelong learning can sometimes be uncomfortable, but the rewards it yields are worth the effort: a sense of belonging for those who may have experienced discrimination or injustice, a purpose beyond oneself, and a celebration of learning and growing with the members of the community that we are building together. In community,

Cat Howell  Co-ED, Educational Director

Shira Rosen  Co-ED, Managing Director

Student Spotlight: Voxy EnGen

You may remember last month we introduced you to our new class called Voxy EnGen, a volunteer-led class that improves students' English, digital literacy, and workforce readiness skills through an adaptive web-based platform. We thought this month you might like to hear from one of our students, Grasela, a level 2-3 ESOL student who is also participating in the Voxy EnGen class. Read on to hear how the class is helping her and what her goals are for the future!

What do you like about Voxy EnGen?   I want to learn English and I need to now how to open computer, how to sign in, how to use it.   Has Voxy EnGen helped you with all of those skills?  Yes, I have been trying for a couple of weeks now and it is a little bit helping. How to spelling, how to reading the alphabet and I can listening a little bit. Even if I didn’t understand a little bit I try to write the alphabet. It is hard, but a couple of weeks has opened my mind so I tried. A little bit better.  What do you study online?  When I study, when I listen the video say something I reading or writing and I try to fill out that thing, the name, what say. And sometimes I fail, but still I back and again I try. I do writing alphabet. From the beginning I didn’t know anything. But now I am understanding a little bit.    What are your goals in the future?   I need better finding job and I want to try by computer I want to better explain in English How to open my email and how to send to other person. I want to learn that well. And I want to fill out by online or by computer too.   How did you find out about Literacy Source?   I take English before, in 2019, the language class. And then when I found that time and I practiced a little bit English and I found a job so I quit to work and then after that, 2020 I stopped that job because of the Corona, and now, again, I try by online so I call the teacher and try the online class.   Thanks, Grasela, for sharing your story with us! Good luck with your future plans!

Volunteer Spotlight: Yvonne Gibb

Yvonne started as a volunteer with Literacy Source in September 2020 and her feet haven't touched the ground since! Her first position was as a class assistant and ABE tutor for the Reading and Writing for GED class. She then became indispensable in the low-level ESOL-1 at the beginning of COVID. Together with the instructor she worked tirelessly by phone and computer to help students master the ins-and-outs of Zoom to join the online class. Always cheerful and enthusiastic to help students learn and develop skills, Yvonne has stepped up to help at every turn, creating materials, attending trainings, and coming up with ideas to support students learning. Her latest endeavor is facilitating one of our new Computer Labs, supporting students as they learn contextualized English using a brand-new software product - Voxy EnGen. She has been a wonderful asset at every turn, and we are so grateful to have had her here during these challenging times for our students. She's also been an active member of our volunteer community that joins discussions and trainings to connect with others and sharpen her thinking about how to best help students.

Read on to find out more about Yvonne:

Where are you originally from? If you’re not from Seattle what brought you here?    Originally from Alberta, Canada, I’ve lived in the US since college, enjoying an unexpected career in retail buying, training, and systems development which is what brought me to Seattle 22 years ago. As a naturalized US citizen, I have vivid memories of preparing for and being interviewed for the exam, and imagining how difficult it would be had I not been a native English speaker. Teaching and volunteer work have always been a passion of mine, and my career provided occasional opportunities to teach adults.

Please share something of your life so far and what you would like to do in the future. In 2016, with an unexpected job change and some soul searching, I decided to pursue my interest in teaching English to speakers of other languages by ‘dipping my toe’ into volunteer work with Seattle Public Library (love the library!) It was hard and fun, and I quickly realized that it would likely be more helpful for the participants, if I took some courses to learn about teaching English. Wrapping up the TESOL certification as Covid lockdowns hit, brought uncertainty and along with that came the opportunity to early-retire from my employment mid 2020. I had studied Arabic several years back and remembered the challenges specific to my own abilities, so I could relate a bit with those I hoped to work with.

To read Yvonne's full interview, please go to our Volunteer Spotlights on our website.

Now Hiring

Literacy Source is hiring! Find out more about our ESOL, Citizenship, or Ready to Work ESOL Instructional Advisor positions on our jobs page or find the job description and how to apply here.

Stay At Home Tea

Don’t take Oolong Time to give! We are well on our way to reach our 65K goal to ensure our vital programs continue to run.  Donate Here

Thank you, donors!

Many thanks to our donors who went above and beyond this month: Steven Stevenson Alice Byers Sherry Perrault Jeanne Martin JustinVoskuhl We couldn't do this work without YOUR support!

Literacy Source is on the traditional lands of the Duwamish people, and we pay our respect to elders both past and present. To support the revival of Duwamish culture and the vitality of the Duwamish Tribe, please consider signing this petition to federally recognize them, or consider making a donation to Real Rent Duwamish.