LLC Spotlight on "Next Step: Literacy"

When we know the answer, we raise our hand. When we feel we can contribute something of value, we speak up. When we're outside our comfort zone, we tend to stay quiet. 

Illiteracy in the United States is an issue that often goes unrecognized, because the people who deal with it are ashamed, or in some way discouraged from asking for help. Now more than ever, being literate is essential to success. Literacy is no longer confined to the relationship between a person and print, but between a person and the rest of the world.

Ultimately, literacy starts with our children. At-risk families don't always have the resources or support they need at home, and even schools are feeling the weight of supporting students who struggle with more pressing issues such as food insecurity and poverty. 

A groundbreaking project called "Next Step: Literacy" out of Georgia State University aims to increase children's literacy with a never before attempted method. The project was completely sans-instructor; instead utilizing tablets programmed with a game to teach children essential literacy skills, all the while, the program works in tandem to familiarize the children with technology.

For more information, read the full story at Georgia State University Magazine and watch the short film below.

Happy Holidays from Loudoun Literacy Council!

It's been a busy holiday season here at LLC, but we were fortunate enough to spend some time with our wonderful volunteers! 

Interested in becoming a volunteer? Check out our training opportunities, and submit a volunteer profile to sign up! 

Thank You!!

We'd like to issue a HUGE THANK YOU to everyone who donated to us yesterday for #GivingTuesday! Above is a video about the Loudoun Literacy Council, who we are, and what our mission is. Please watch it and share it with your friends so you can know what your donations go towards! Thank you again, and have a very happy holiday season!

Loudoun Literacy Council awarded 2014 Top-rated Nonprofits!

We were honored to be awarded as a 2014 Top-Rated Nonprofit. A big thank you to everyone who reviewed our organization!

Volunteer. Donate. Review.

LLC Spotlight on Cambodia

When many people hear “Cambodia,” they tend to think of rice paddies, gnarled banyan trees, and ancient temples. Thirty or forty years ago, Cambodia was a country in political turmoil under the regime of Pol Pot. Today, the people of Cambodia are still recovering from the scars left by the Khmer Rouge, but the country is far more beautiful and welcoming to tourists than it has ever been in the past.

FACTS ABOUT CULTURE IN CAMBODIA: In Khmer culture a person's head is believed to contain the person's soul—therefore making it taboo to touch or point one's feet at it. It is also considered to be extremely disrespectful to use the feet to point out a person, or to sit or sleep with the soles of the feet pointing at a person, as the feet are the lowest part of the body and are considered to be impure. When greeting people or to show respect in Cambodia people do the "sampeah" gesture, identical to the Indian bamaste and Thai wai. Customary Cambodian teachings are laid out in verse form in long works from the 14th to 18th centuries collectively called Chhbap ("rules" or "codes").These were traditionally learned by rote. Works such as the Chhbap Pros ("Boy's Code"), Chhbap Srey ("Girl's Code") and Chhbap Peak Chas ("Code of Ancient Words") gave such advice as: a person that does not wake up before sunrise is lazy; a child must tell parents or elders where they go and what time they will return home; always close doors gently, otherwise a bad temper will be assumed; sit in a chair with the legs straight down and not crossed (crossing the legs is a mark of an impolite person); and always let the other person do more talking. In Cambodia it is not polite to make eye contact with someone who is older or someone who is considered a superior.  (Source: "A Country Study: Cambodia." Cambodia : Country Studies. N.p., n.d. Web. 27 Oct. 2014. <http://lcweb2.loc.gov/frd/cs/khtoc.html>.)

        This term, we have a few students in our classes who call Cambodia their native home. To celebrate their country and culture, Liesl Stach, one of the AmeriCorps service members at LLC who spent three weeks in Cambodia in May 2013 as part of a class on travel writing with her college, shares her thoughts and recollections on the country.

 “To get around the big cities, many people take tuk-tuks – open air carriages attached to the back of motorbikes. Depending on how far you want to go, it costs only one or two dollars to get from place to place, but that’s a thousand or two thousand riel. In Sihanoukville, the ‘vacation’ city of Cambodia, you can take a tuk-tuk to a pleasant beach to watch the sun set into the Indian Ocean as you sip on a daiquiri and politely decline the older women who offer to give you massage you for a few dollars. 

      
     The more populated beaches are all right, but they’re swarming with young children, plucked from school by their parents to sell fruit to tourists in order to help with the income. Sometimes the children will mob tourists, one or two touching the tourist’s arm saying, ‘Such pretty skin! Very white!’ while another child picks the tourist’s pockets. The children of Cambodia are adorable, with dark brown skin and large eyes, and oftentimes so small that it’s not uncommon for a twelve-year-old to be confused for a six-year-old – but they insult you if you do not buy what they’re selling.

      

   To appeal to tourists, several pizza joints have sprung up in the bigger cities like Phnom Penh and Siem Reap. But what they sell is ‘happy pizza’ – pizza made with cannabis. It’s not exactly legal to sell it, since marijuana is banned in Cambodia, but shop owners do it anyway. You mostly see partying Australian twenty-somethings on their gap year eating in these places. Street vendors will sell you fried tarantulas, grasshoppers, crickets and cockroaches. Surprisingly, they don’t taste like anything strange. The bugs have the texture of potato chips and the salty taste of sunflower seeds. They’re just sort of hairy. Breakfasts at the hotels consist of pho noodles and fruit, but there are also juicy sausages and eggs. The restaurants, however, serve the most delicious food you’ve ever tasted, like lotus root salad with chicken and young lotus seeds and galangal dressing, fish filet with bread and sautéed vegetables, stir-fried beef with lemon grass onions and green bell peppers,  fried chocolate-banana spring rolls, and red sticky rice dumplings. And of course, jasmine or fried rice accompanies every dish.

In Phnom Penh, there is a temple called Wat Phnom, which translates to ‘Hillside Temple.’ There are temples like this all over the country, sacred places where people come to pray and leave offerings to Buddha. Feral dogs will lounge in the shade, seeking refuge from the scorching sun and sniffing the shoes that people leave outside the temple. Burning incense hangs in clusters from the awning. Men stand outside with cages full of small birds, ready to sell you one for a couple riel. There is a belief that if you let one of the birds out of the cage and it flies back to you, it will bring you good karma. Outside of Siem Reap is Angkor Wat, a crumbling stone temple in the middle of the jungle. It’s something right out of Indiana Jones or Lara Croft. Incense burns here too, and statues of the Buddha can be found around nearly every archaic corner. The stone floor makes it easy to stumble, but if you climb all the way up to the top of the temple, you can survey the surrounding banyan trees and the sky that’s so blue you feel like you’re in a cartoon instead of real life, and in a country that has such a chaotic and troubled history, you’ll feel stupidly amazed by the serenity you feel on top of that temple.”

LLC Spotlight on Malala Yousafzai

Although Malala Yousafzai is a mere 17 years old, she has captivated a global audience with her powerful message. Her journey began at the age of 11, with a blog post which was published on BBC Urdu. Using a pen name to protect herself and her family, the entry expressed her concerns for female education under the Taliban. Unfortunately she was still brutally targeted and attacked by the Taliban, but has made a miraculous recovery. A champion for youth education and empowerment, Malala was awarded the 2014 Nobel Peace Prize. She has taken advantage of this monumental accomplishment to start the Malala Fund, a children’s education fund.

Welcome Keelin and Liesl, our 2014-2015 AmeriCorps Members!

After a long and fairly hectic month of intense training and on-the-job learning, our new AmeriCorps members have settled into their roles at LLC. We are so excited to introduce them!

Keelin McGill hails from Morgantown, West Virginia. She attended West Virginia University, where she received a BA in Professional Writing and Editing with a minor in Spanish. During her time at WVU she worked in the Center for Literary Computing, as well as the Department of World Languages, Literatures, and Linguistics, where she realized that Teaching English as a Second Language would allow her to combine everything she loved- the studies of English, Linguistics, and Spanish.

Keelin studied German, French, and Russian at a young age, but got serious about learning another language when she started studying Spanish as a Sophomore at WVU. She knows first-hand that learning a new language as an adult can be frustrating, time-consuming, and scary. She teaches a beginner level ESOL class at Douglass Community Center twice a week, and a multi-level class at Guilford Elementary. "I'm so impressed by my student's desire to learn, and their determination to meet their goals in English. What they take from the classroom will help them build confidence to communicate in their everyday lives. That's what makes this job so rewarding."

Keelin is also excited to work with the fantastic people at Loudoun Literacy Council, and learn everything she can from them. Upon completion of her AmeriCorps service, she plans on returning to graduate school to study Applied Linguistics and TESOL.

Liesl Stach is a native of Northern Virginia and graduated from Roanoke College with a BA in creative writing this past May. "I've always loved reading and writing," she says. "I hope to implement that same love in my students." Her interests besides writing include singing and playing the ukulele -- skills that she hopes to eventually use in her classes. Liesl teaches a beginner ESOL class at Sterling Library on Monday and Thursday evenings, as well as an ESOL class at Dominion High School on Wednesday mornings for parents of children in the Head Start program. She finds a lot of joy in teaching, "but I would be one hundred percent okay if I never had to step foot in a high school during school hours ever again," she jokes.

Liesl first became interested in the idea of teaching ESOL during her junior year of college, when she spent three weeks in Cambodia during May 2013. "I was taking a class on travel writing," she says, "And I was bitten by the travel bug. I wanted to travel the world and write about my journeys, like Rick Steves. So I talked to my professor and he suggested applying to teach English abroad. I figured if I wanted to do that, I should get some experience teaching ESOL in the US first. So after my year of service with AmeriCorps, I hope to go to grad school for education or TESOL or even English again, and then start traveling."

Other than Cambodia, Liesl has also visited the UK, Ireland, France, the Netherlands, Germany, Austria, Italy, Bermuda, and the Dominican Republic.