2026 Iowa Adult Education & Literacy Conference

Many adult learners come to class after a long day of work, family responsibilities, and life stress. This session shares practical strategies to help instructors increase engagement and participation—even when students are tired. We’ll explore simple, techniques that make lessons more interactive, support learner persistence, and help adult ELL students stay involved in the learning process.

- Talk about the different ways we keep online students participating in lessons each day so that don't feel like they are relegated to the background. 
- Keeping an active effort to engage them so that they can overcome their insecurities/fears of disrupting the class because they are actually part of the class, not a separate group. 

Integrated Education and Training (IET) programs rely on strong collaboration between instructors to successfully blend adult education and literacy, workforce preparation, and workforce training. However, co-teaching is often implemented without clear structure, shared planning time, or defined roles—leading to inconsistent student outcomes.
This session explores practical, field-tested co-teaching models designed specifically for IET settings, including adult learners and non-native English speakers. In addition to instructional strategies, the session will examine the working relationship between content specialists and ABE/ESL instructors, with a focus on role negotiation, shared authority in the classroom, and leveraging complementary expertise.

Participants will explore how to align expectations, communicate effectively across disciplines, and navigate common tensions—such as balancing technical rigor with language and literacy support. Through real-world examples and interactive activities, attendees will learn how to implement multiple co-teaching approaches (e.g., team teaching, station teaching, parallel instruction) and determine which models best fit their program structure.