This handbook is for volunteer tutors, student interns, and VISTA volunteers working with adult basic education (ABE) and English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) learners. The community-based handbook contains information about adult literacy and tutoring--what tutors do, who the learners are, and how the literacy learning process works. Introductory pages describe the Adult Academy of Rhode Island, its literacy programs, community-based education, and an overview of literacy learners, ESL, and reading and writing. The next section covers the following: a comparison of traditional and learner-directed education models, an introduction to problem solving in tutoring, an overview of learners' literacy and educational needs, and suggestions for observing learners. A section on getting started explains the rationale behind a learner-centered approach to adult literacy learning, presents some basic teaching tools, and provides activities and materials to use with specific topics such as family housing, work, and transportation. Included with this section is a sample curriculum and lesson plan. Specific practices for ABE and ESL form the content of the next two sections, followed by a discussion of tutors' roles and responsibilities. The next section catalogues a wide range of approaches and activities: audiotapes; bingo; cloze; dialogue journals; dyads; flashcards; grids; interview/information grids; alphanumeric grids; hangman; language experience approach; operations; pair work; photos; picture stories; realia; scrambling/sequencing; total physical response; visuals; and writers' groups. Four learner-generated publications and 21 books/materials from publishing houses are included. The concluding section provides suggestions for tutors and learners and tutor responses from workshops using this handbook. (NLA)