The following announcement is posted at the request of Aaron Kohring,
moderator of the Content Standards Discussion List.

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Greetings colleagues,

Next week, Monday, August 28 thru Friday, September 1, the Content
Standards Discussion List will be hosting a guest discussion on the
CASAS Basic Skills Content Standards Project.  Our guests will be Jane
Eguez, Jim Harrison, and Linda Taylor from CASAS.

Please read the introductory information below which includes a link to
the CASAS website to help prepare you for the discussion.

To participate, sign up for the list at:
http://www.nifl.gov/mailman/listinfo/Contentstandards

Aaron

Aaron Kohring
Moderator, National Institute for Literacy's Content Standards
Discussion List (http://www.nifl.gov/mailman/listinfo/Contentstandards)


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Since its inception, CASAS (Comprehensive Adult Student Assessment
System) has focused on teaching and assessing basic skills in contexts
that are relevant and important to adult learners. CASAS has developed
and continues to refine a highly formalized hierarchy of competencies,
the application of basic skills that adults need to be fully functional
and productive members of society. 

In the past few years, at the request of the CASAS National Consortium,
representing approximately 30 states, CASAS has begun development of
basic skills content standards as a formal part of the CASAS system.
This enhancement of the CASAS system is intended to assist and encourage
teachers to more fully integrate basic skills content standards and
functional competencies in instruction.

The basic skills content standards for Reading and Listening contain
simple, clearly stated, detailed statements that are leveled according
to the NRS Educational Functioning Levels, and are also related to CASAS
test items in several CASAS test series. The statements are divided into
Categories to assist teachers to navigate through the standards. 

In the past two years, CASAS has worked with Iowa and California to
pilot these standards with teachers in a variety of adult education
programs. A number of useful teacher worksheets and other tools have
emerged from these efforts.

We invite you to learn more about the CASAS basic skills Content
Standards Project and to ask questions about it during the listserv
discussion next week. To prepare for this discussion, we refer you to
the CASAS website where you will find more detailed information about
the development of the standards, the standards themselves, worksheets
for teachers, and information about the pilot project in Iowa. Go to
http://www.casas.org/DirctDwnlds.cfm?mfile_id=4504&selected_id=1720&wtar
get=body 

We look forward to engaging with you in this discussion next week.

Jane Eguez (jeguez at casas.org) , Jim Harrison (jharrison at casas.org ) and
Linda Taylor (ltaylor at casas.org ), CASAS