3. Self - Esteem and Literacy

* * * * * * * * * * by Dorothee Komangapik * * * * * * * * * *

photo: Steve Sunstrum

DOROTHEE KOMANGAPIK was born in Germany at the end of the Second World War and was raised in southern Ontario. Her lifelong hearing impairment, unidentified by her teachers during her early education, made her aware of the difficulties and frustrations of an undiagnosed learning problem. She failed to complete high school but had surprising success in university as a mature student. A negative marital experience in the early 1970s, as well as her childhood sexual abuse, acquainted her with serious feminist concerns and taught her valuable survival skills. She calls her 12-year residence in Pond Inlet, as a member of the Inuit community, her "apprenticeship" in Inuit life with her husband and family-in-law.

She is passionately involved in northern aboriginal literacy issues, helping initiate the N.W.T. Literacy Association and promoting first language literacy as a necessity for English literacy. She currently works as an instructor at . Nunavut Arctic College where she specializes in innovative multi-level adult literacy classroom instruction.

In 1993 she gained her master's degree in adult education, and in 1994 became a grandmother.

Introduction

Many Inuit women on Baffin Island have reported that they seek literacy learning in order to improve their own lives and the lives of their children. They may be school drop-outs, compelled to leave school at an early age due to some family circumstance, an untimely pregnancy or their lack of progress in learning. Often it was a combination of factors that made them leave school. Their families may not value education. They may even now be undertaking literacy learning, they have said, because they believe they must. Many Inuit women have said that if they become literate in English, they will be able to get a non-menial job. Literacy learning may give hope for bettering themselves and their lives.

Women literacy learners from every culture suffer many stresses as they attempt to learn. They may be anxious about leaving their small children or babies with baby sitters or in day care. They may suffer poverty for any number of reasons. They may be malnourished. They may have hearing, sight or other learning problems. They may have emotional or health problems. They may not know how to get along with people outside of their families and may be unsure of themselves outside of their homes. They may be survivors of assault and abuse. They may still be suffering assault and abuse. They may have turned to unhealthy coping styles in order to face their daily lives. The reasons why many women literacy learners begin their learning with a very low sense of self-esteem are countless.

Unrealistic expectations of literacy learning can undermine learning. In literacy training, many women learners expect to learn the tools of reading and writing and that is all. Many of them are not aware that how they think about themselves can help or hinder their literacy learning. I like to offer an opportunity for women literacy learners to learn and develop repair skills for their sense of self-esteem as part of their literacy learning in order to facilitate their learning. A special effort made by the instructor or tutor right from the moment of contact with the learners will enhance their progress. Combination exercises which build self-esteem at the same time as they build literacy skills have proven to be effective in developing the already-existing sense of self-esteem which brought them into the literacy learning group.

Following is a selection of self-esteem literacy exercises that I have used to help Inuit women literacy learners value themselves in order to take the risks that need to be taken to learn well. These exercises may be useful for women literacy learners from any background.

So that the learners know beforehand what is expected of them and what it is all about, it is good to introduce each exercise. In this way literacy learners are less prone to feel manipulated. Instead they may feel safer knowing what is about to happen.

The exercises can be adapted for one-on-one literacy work, except for Section D, "Same and Different." Please feel free to adapt, excerpt and modify the exercises to suit your learners. Take what you like and leave the rest.

I have assumed for these exercises that you have on hand supplies of scissors, glue, lined paper, colored paper and art paper.

Whenever disadvantaged women get together, there exists the ,possibility that emotional and legal issues may arise that require , professional guidance. The literacy worker (tutor or instructor) must prepare herself by establishing channels for referral for a range of community support services to meet the needs of her learners.
(See "Responding to Disclosures of Abuse in Women's Lives," page 15.)