What's New

Australian Adult Language, Literacy and Numeracy National Standards

The Australian Core Skills Framework (ACSF) describes levels of performance in five core skills which they have identified as essential for people to participate in our society. These are:

•  Learning
•  Reading
•  Writing
•  Oral Communication
•  Numeracy
•  The Industry Skills Council (ISC) Proposals for Action identifies a number of goals required to address the LLN challenge, i.e.
•  Set learners up for success
•  Support training product users
•  Change the mindset of employers and employees
•  Boost VET system capacity
•  Invest wisely

A RTO meeting the challenge

GoodStart Training College, a highly regarded RTO that delivers qualifications to the early childhood education sector, embraced the LLN challenge at its National Conference held in Brisbane in February.

The focus was on programs that support students' soft skills i.e. communication and problem solving skills. The starting point was to look at the foundations of LLN and to refresh and redevelop an understanding within its team of 28 trainers.

"Our motivation is ensuring we are empowering the learners, setting them up to feel confident in the environment and take control," said GoodStart Training College Manager, Sarah Martin. "When you have a trainer who is confident they will achieve fantastic results."

Training the trainers

The facilitator, Irena Morgan, RTO owner of MW Training Consultants and the developer of two nationally accredited LLN courses, earned high praise from the GoodStart team with a comprehensive agenda, complete with practical examples, that covered topics from LLN in Vocational Education and Training (VET), ACSF levels, learning styles, LLN issues in the workplace and implementation of GoodStart's Early Learning Framework (ELF) strategies for LLN.

Direct benefit to students

Trainers came away with full confidence in their LLN program and heightened enthusiasm about delivering the strategies and practical applications on to their students. Tammi Tregellas, a GoodStart Trainer and Assessor based in Adelaide said, "As a group of trainers we identified which areas needed greater understanding. Focusing on both levels, what we can teach our students will also help them with coursework. The more supported they feel, and confident, the better they can educate the children, particularly in the first three years.

"I'll have a better understanding of support and techniques to help my students. I know what is needed to make a great child care worker but knowing what techniques and support I can use for them to achieve and to develop more rounded LLN skills in their everyday workings is essential. LLN skills underpin everything else you do on a daily basis. They have an impact on every part of students' lives and then this rolls on to the children.

Tammi Tregellas, Goodstart Trainer and Assessor

Step by step on a learning journey

"We should not get caught up in the end product. We must look at the steps along the way and how we can help students and educators step by step. It is not simply a matter of looking at the present and the future but of making it a step by step process - on a learning journey."

Professional Development

Clare Collins, as the Operational Coordinator based at the Professional Development Centre in Caboolture, is responsible for the workflow and monitoring the trainers to ensure that the processes are smooth, consistent and meet GoodStart's policies. Clare said, "GoodStart has really promoted our PD over the last year and the support and encouragement we get from our managers has allowed us to explore our own personal interests, for example, mine is LLN."

Clare said that the conference "has really made my knowledge more concrete and the training really focused on what we do as a team and our professional conversations and raises the question of what has worked and what hasn't.

Clare has a cohort of students in the Sunshine Coast region who in addition to receiving regular visits also meet up at local libraries and community halls. Bi monthly workshops are held at their workshop facility at Pacific Paradise.

Irena Morgan with Clare Collins Goodstart's Operational Coordinator

Workshops

GoodStart holds workshops in all capital cities and on a three monthly basis in their regional centres. Trainees, apprentices and other students attend workshops that cover theory, group discussions and research. Trainer Assessors travel regularly to regional areas to support students with their study.

Tammi Tregellas echoes not only the GoodStart Training College staff's sentiments, but probably that of most people in any RTO, when she said of the PD workshop on LLN, "I'm glad to have had the opportunity of attending. LLN is important not just for training but for the society we all have to understand and support."

To discuss your organisation's specific PD needs for LLN contact MW Training Consultants on 07 3203 4203 or visit www.teach2learn.com.au to access specific LLN learning resources across numerous vocational and employment categories for your RTO.

Research provided from seven communities across Australia has identified the explicit and implicit barriers towards gaining education and employment with the result that the [Learner Guide for the Certificate II in Government] focuses on five factors that are intrinsic to the ongoing development of Indigenous education.

1. The need to protect, nurture, preserve and pass on cultural traditions and practices and societal frameworks, including the integral cultural connectivity to land
2. The need to implement or maintain only those actions and policies which can be shown to decrease the incidence of child abuse (i.e. they have to be evidence based), either directly or through dealing with casual links (i.e. increasing general health and well-being levels, and reducing the incidence of substance abuse, etc.)
3. The need for formal and informal community based consultation processes, to ensure maximum effectiveness on a case by case (including community by community, and, importantly, even house by house) basis – rather than a "one size fits all" approach.
4. The need and right for all Indigenous communities in the NT, all those living in remote communities to have "service parity" – the use and access to ancillary institutional services and utilities at a level equivalent to and equitable with that of the rest of the Australian community.
5. The need and right for all those living in remote Australia to have proper and formal local/regional representation in the decision-making and policy making processes affecting these regions.

Submission To Emergency Response review by Simon Balderstone AM. Director, Ways and Means Consultancy Pty Ltd; Advisor, Yothu Yindi Foundation/Garma Festival; former Indigenous affairs Adviser to Prime Ministers Hawke and Keating;  click here to view.

Indigenous training

Cognizant of these factors, and using them to underpin their training, Training Connections Australia (TCA) is emerging as a leader in Indigenous training and in supporting employment pathways for its clients in remote service areas. They have developed unique project-based training programs that incorporate essential skills and knowledge for entering the workforce, integrating cultural ethics and workplace practices.

The TCA Board of Directors considers lack of LLN skills to be a key element in preventing people in Indigenous communities getting into training and work. "They see LLN skills as a way to lift self esteem. Because English is the third language for a lot of communities teaching them reading and writing competency enables them to move from one culture to another with ease."

LLN tailored to Indigenous communities

Specializing in bringing forward Indigenous people all across Australia and continuously up-skilling their trainers, TCA's Community Training Coordinator Anastasia (Ana) Fidow went searching for the best in LLN training. "When I did research on LLN Irena Morgan's name came up again and again. I am familiar with her RTO and MW Training's pre-vocational resources and have used them before. So I put together a project proposal for an intensive training workshop to be held in Cairns."

Ana Fidow (second from left back row) with her clients from Ramnigining

Fifteen trainers were deliberately selected. They flew in from all over Australia excited at the opportunity to continue developing more tools and resources to assist in their work in Indigenous communities in WA, NT, Torres Strait and Cape York. As Ana said, "The biggest things for us in LLN isn't simply about reading and writing but about valuing the community knowledge and ability to read road signs so our trainers want to integrate their learning styles into what we deliver – making whatever we deliver more relevant in practical terms."

Two week intensive LLN course

The two week course was a program tailored to the needs of the attendees, their level of experience, and to the people it would be flowing through to. The Cert IV course in LLN in Assessment and Training is an accredited course as opposed to a training package – the only one offered across Australia.

Jennie Dukes, Manager of MW Training Consultants said, "As part of the introduction we utilised case studies from a recent MW Training Consultant's Workplace English Language and Literacy (WELL) project which deals with the difficulties faced by Indigenous youth in rural and remote communities who are trying to gain entry into the workplace. The case studies and stories from these communities resonated with TCA trainers who were able to compare them with their own experiences in the field".

The two week face to face course is being followed up via distance education and MW Training has assigned trainers who are mandated to engage with the students, with monthly contact and random audits of client satisfaction.

Colleen Holmes, who has been a TCA trainer for two years, said of the course, "I gained a perspective very different from my original understanding of LLN as very much about reading and writing. I gained an insight on how to understand and assess people's different abilities. I am much better equipped now!"

Coleen Holmes with Student

At the forefront

Irena Morgan, Director of MW Training said, "The PD program for all the trainers is unique. It is hoped that 600 trainers will eventually participate in the program. They will be at the forefront of a state and federal push to have all trainers trained in LLN."

To discuss your organisation's specific PD needs for LLN contact MW Training Consultants on 07 3203 5203 or visit www.teach2learn.com.au to access specific LLN learning resources across numerous vocational and employment categories for your RTO.

The 2011 National VET Conference was held on the 4^th and 5^th of August and our very own director Irena Morgan was there presenting. The day consisted of many experts in the VET field providing their wealth of knowledge in Business, Social Networks for Education, Learning Strategies and more!

For an overview of what was covered go to http://www.velgtraining.com/national-conference-program.cfm

To see Irena Morgans PowerPoint on ‘The Economics of Literacy’ click here

Language, Literacy and Numeracy (LLN) are now recognised as key underpinning skills for generic employability and learning, to learn skills at all levels of the Australian Qualifications Framework (AQF).
To address LLN issues there is a need for well trained adult LLN practitioners.
MW Training Consultants has trainers who currently hold the Vocational Graduate Diploma of Adult LLN Leadership in addition to other post graduate qualifications. They are here to assist you progress through your training.

We currently offer the Vocational Graduate Diploma of Adult LLN Leadership TAE80110 (VGD) via distance learning for $5000 and Vocational Graduate Certificate in Adult LLN Practice TAE70110 (VGC) for $4000.

Enrol to start on the path to your new career today!!