We need to be prepared to engage as individuals, parents, workers and citizens with economic, social and cultural change, including the continued globalisation of the economy and society, with new work and leisure patterns and with the rapid expansion of communication technologies.
I had to ask people to write things down for me, now I can write for myself. Community learning is not just important – it is part of my life!
CURRENT ISSUES IN ADULT AND COMMUNITY LEARNING PROVISION
This Guide is intended for the wide range of providers involved in teaching literacy, numeracy and ESOL skills in settings that appeal to adults, especially adult learners who have commitments and concerns that mean that they cannot travel far from where they live. We include in this dedicated adult education centres, community centres, community schools and other facilities with a neighbourhood or community focus. For many years, literacy, numeracy and ESOL work with adults was mainly the provenance of local authorities, but since incorporation, further education colleges have extended their activities in this area, and now play a major role in the widening participation agenda. The Government’s commitment to community development has also led to an increase in the number of community and voluntary sector organisations that are helping adults to improve their literacy, numeracy and language skills. At the same time, its determination to raise the literacy and numeracy skill levels in schools has led to many initiatives that involve parents in the education of their children, thereby improving their own skills.
Adult and community learning providers are relatively new to the inspection process. This Guide is intended to help them, and others, take a realistic look at the strengths and weaknesses in their literacy, numeracy and ESOL provision, with a view to improving practice, securing continuous improvement and embedding quality in their Skills for Life provision.
The best teaching of literacy, numeracy and ESOL skills in the adult and community learning context is characterised by good tutor: learner ratios, strong sensitivity to learners’ needs and circumstances, good personal support and encouragement for learners and a culture of mutual respect. An increasing number of adult and community learning providers are achieving good grades at inspection. Even so, there is still room for improvement. Individual or group learning plans of a very variable quality, unimaginative resources, few quality assurance mechanisms (especially in non-accredited learning), poor learning environments and a lack of coherent or reliable data about progress and achievement are some of the areas causing concern. And while most staff have conscientiously familiarised themselves with the contents of the national curricula and have diligently set about implementing it, in the process, the focus on the learner has sometimes lost its edge. Many learning plans are devoid of information about what it is the learner wants to be able to do. Many teaching materials, while they might be at the appropriate level, lack significant, challenging content that is relevant to the learner. Sometimes learners are expected to use the same generic materials whether they are studying on a vocational programme or learning in a community context.
Measuring achievement in adult learning remains a thorny issue. This is always a complex business, because of the diversity of adults’ lives. Added to this is the fact that many adults do not wish to study for qualifications. Yet the questions remain: are reasonable numbers of learners achieving, are they achieving at appropriate levels and are they using their skills to progress at work, at home and in their communities?
In this situation, it is clear that learning plans, whether individual or collective, are fundamental to teaching and learning, and to assessing progress and demonstrating achievement. The learning plan is the route map that enables learners to reach, without unnecessary digressions, the end of a journey (or a new beginning), which they have had a large role in defining. The literacy, numeracy and ESOL national curricula provide the coordinates for crucial reference points along the way. However, the route map will only serve the purpose if it is based on initial and diagnostic assessment which effectively establishes the learner’s starting point. And the learner’s progress along the route can be most effectively demonstrated through formative and summative assessment which has been mapped to the coordinates.
We recognise that it may be important for providers to read two or more raising standards guides in tandem. Some providers offer very diverse programmes. Some, for example, are committed to developing Skills for Life in the workplace as well as in the community. This is a trend that is likely to continue following the launch of Get On, the local government Skills for Life strategy for 2005 to 2007, by the Employers’ Organisation for Local Government.
Then there’s the fact that definitions of ‘community’ are becoming increasingly fluid. Learning communities may be held together over considerable distances by concepts of kinship, ethnicity, faith, gender and common cause. This raises new challenges in terms of assuring quality.
Lastly, many tutors and managers are working in a mixed economy, employed by a further education college, but working in a community outreach venue; or working in a voluntary organisation, but subcontracted by a local authority.
In these situations, reading one or more guides alongside this one will provide insights into how the Common Inspection Framework can be interpreted in different educational settings, and prompt ideas for ensuring that provision of different types is of equal quality. In all situations, readers are urged to use the guides as aids to designing solutions that will work for them and their learners. There is seldom a one-size-fits-all solution to designing high quality into large organisations, attractive though that may sound.
THE SCOPE OF THIS GUIDE
This Guide is designed to help providers achieve excellence in their literacy, numeracy and ESOL provision for learners in adult and community learning. By taking each of the five questions of the Common Inspection Framework in turn, it is designed to help providers interpret the requirements of the Common Inspection Framework and the adult basic skills curricula for provision in communication, reading, writing and numeracy.
The Guide also sets out the characteristics of best practice in literacy, numeracy and ESOL provision, in particular by drawing on real examples. The examples are designed to give staff practical help and ideas for improving their literacy, numeracy and ESOL provision.
We wanted this series of guides to offer practical help to providers and practitioners – a ‘How to’ guide that would really focus on what works. For that reason, as well as providing sample materials that can be adapted for different learning environments, the guides illustrate what success might look like. For example, how do we know when a learner has made an important new step in their learning? What might be the outcomes of a successful initial assessment? The short descriptions of the progress made by real learners in real situations help to answer such questions.
Finally, the guides all highlight comments from inspectors on this area of work in inspection reports and other documents. These extracts are included to help readers gain an insight into how Ofsted and the ALI evaluate and report on this context for learning.
WHAT IS SUCCESS IN THE ADULT AND COMMUNITY LEARNING CONTEXT?
Many learners can provide powerful testimony of how learning has had a dramatic impact upon their lives – as in the case of the learner who explained that she had just written her first cheque and no longer had to ask her neighbour to read her bank statements for her. She was describing a growth in dignity, not just the acquisition of new skills. Many learners are clear about their objectives – Bakary, who is learning literacy and numeracy, told us, ‘I am not doing this for a job, definitely not! I just want to do this for my own personal life.’ He wanted to be able to read to his children. Lisa, studying childcare, told us, ‘My greatest achievement on this course has been my self-confidence.’ These and the many other learners in the varied contexts that make up adult and community learning provision deserve the best that we can give them. It is hoped that this Guide will help us to reach that goal.
