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Inspirational teachers who have helped migrants and refugees make a new home in Australia or given adults with educational setbacks a second chance are the focus of a new resource that will help develop the next generation of adult literacy and numeracy teachers.

Making Connections: Adult Literacy & Numeracy Practice is a DVD and handbook that captures the experiences, philosophies and approaches of a group of experienced adult literacy and numeracy teachers nominated by their colleagues as leading practitioners.

A collaborative project between the Faculty of Education at the University of Technology, Sydney and the NSW Adult Literacy and Numeracy Council, Making Connections was recently launched at UTS.

Project team member Keiko Yasukawa said a generation of experienced adult literacy and numeracy teachers is nearing retirement and the likelihood that their knowledge would be lost had been the spur for the project.

"Many of these teachers have made significant contributions to the field, and the Council and the teacher educators at UTS felt it was important that their knowledge and expertise remained accessible to future teachers who won't have the benefit of their direct mentoring and influence," Dr Yasukawa said.

"It was also thought the resource would benefit the increasing number of literacy and numeracy teachers who work in smaller and diverse organisations that may not be able to provide in-house professional development programs."

The DVD features the classroom practices of teachers in four different sites and interviews with them and their learners. The learning situations include a youth centre partnership between an outreach unit and an adult basic education unit in a TAFE college; a joint vocational education and training and Adult Migrant English Program in a community college; and a numeracy workshop and flexible learning class in TAFE.

The handbook provides supporting material including a summary of the views of experienced teachers, activities and discussions of effective practices.

Making Connections was developed by Dr Jacquie Widin, Dr Keiko Yasukawa and Andrew Chodkiewicz in partnership with the NSW Adult Literacy and Numeracy Council, and supported by an Adult Literacy Innovative Grant from the Federal Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations.

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