Understanding Success and Failure in Adult ESL: Superación vs Dropout of Adult English Learners in the US

This book explores the reasons why adult ESL learners drop out of their language classes and suggests explicit strategies for keeping students engaged. The most effective strategies may be personal rather than technical or curricular. Based on a study of a group of Mexican immigrants to the US, the author proposes that superación or ‘self-actualization’ is crucial to understanding the relative success of adult ESL learners. Learners’ decisions to drop out were not hasty or superficial but w...