Walk into almost any adult education classroom, and you’ll see students using more than textbooks and whiteboards. You’ll find smartphones, messaging apps, shared documents, and learners navigating a complex digital world alongside their studies.
A recent field report shares observations from the pilot implementation of the new free curriculum CILIA-T (Content-Integrated Language Instruction for Adults with Technology Support). The curriculum is designed to teach U.S history, civics, and English language skills in an integrated way, while also building in opportunities to strengthen students’ digital skills. The report offers a revealing look at what’s working, what’s not, and, most importantly, how educators are adapting in real time.
The curriculum was created by the report’s authors, Aydin Durgunoğlu, Erin Cary, Jack Hartford, and Kiana Yarbrough, University of Minnesota, Duluth; and Leah Hauge, Northstar/Literacy Minnesota. Their big takeaway? Digital learning isn’t just an add-on anymore. It’s the environment. And while that brings incredible opportunity, it also introduces new challenges that educators are solving in creative, practical ways.
A Highly Uneven Digital Landscape
The four classrooms observed in the study varied widely between fully online and hybrid, and all had various levels of access, infrastructure, and digital comfort.
Students came in with mixed experience:
- Many were comfortable using everyday tools like messaging apps or translation tools.
- Fewer had experience with platforms like email, online forms, or structured learning tools.
- Nearly all needed support in at least some area of digital literacy.
Teachers were juggling multiple tools, formats, and delivery methods, often teaching both in-person and online students at the same time.
The result? A learning environment full of potential—but also friction.
Challenge 1: Wide Gaps in Digital Skills
In every classroom, digital literacy levels ranged from beginner to highly proficient. That variability made it difficult to move at a consistent pace or rely on a single tool.
What Worked
1. Teachers didn’t rely on one format. They used many. This ensured that no students were left out, regardless of their comfort level. Materials were shared as:
- emails,
- messaging apps,
- printed packets,
- photos of documents, and
- online forms and links.
2. Rather than constantly introducing new tools, instructors reused the same platforms repeatedly. This helped learners build confidence through familiarity.
3. Successful classrooms layered supports, such as:
- audio for pronunciation,
- visual annotations,
- closed captions on videos, and
- adjustable playback speeds.
The key insight: repetition + variety = accessibility.
Challenge 2: Hybrid Classrooms
Hybrid (or “hyflex”) classrooms often felt like running two classes at once. Teachers had to split attention between in-person and online learners, while students struggled to interact across formats.
What Worked
1. Class-wide messaging groups became a lifeline to share links and reminders, answer questions, and interact with peers. These spaces removed the line between in-person and online participation.
2. Housing all resources in one shared digital location (like a cloud drive) ensured that every student could access the same content, regardless of attendance mode.
3. Teachers leveraged peer support by:
- encouraging tech-savvy learners to help others,
- creating opportunities for small group collaboration, and
- promoting peer-to-peer problem solving.
This helped build learner confidence and leadership.
Challenge 3: File Organization
One of the most surprising barriers wasn’t access—it was organization. Many students struggled to revisit materials after the initial lesson.
What Worked
1. Teachers created predictable routines for where and how materials were shared, helping students build habits around accessing them.
2. Instead of expecting students to revisit materials independently, instructors intentionally reintroduced key concepts across lessons.
3. The move toward an ebook-style curriculum gave learners a single, consistent place to find content, reducing fragmentation.
4. Providing printed materials alongside digital ones helped some learners stay more organized and engaged.
A Smarter Way to Teach Digital Skills
One of the most important insights from the study challenges a common practice of frontloading digital skills at the start. Digital literacy was embedded in meaningful learning by:
- introducing tools gradually,
- aligning each tool to a clear purpose, and
- reinforcing skills through ongoing use.
What This Means for Adult Education
The report makes one thing clear: online and hybrid learning are here to stay. But success doesn’t come from simply adding technology—it comes from intentionally designing how it’s used.
The educators in this study were adapting by experimenting, adjusting, and finding what worked for their learners.
Digital learning in adult education isn’t about having the latest tools. It’s about creating environments where learners, no matter their starting point, can build confidence, skills, and independence in a digital world.