Guroo Functional Skills at the Learning and Skills show, stand 213.
Wednesday, 30 January 2013
Stand picture
Guroo Functional Skills at the Learning and Skills show, stand 213.
Learning and Skills Exhibition
A first for me, not at BETT as it clashes with a much more important show for Guroo - the Learning and Skills/Learning Technologies show in London. We could have done both with some pain, but in the end decided not to.
Our key markets at Guroo Functional Skills are training providers, the larger companies that run their own apprenticeship programmes and the FE sector. All three are well represented here, but BETT is more schools orientated (and much more expensive).
And because keeping our price very competitive is hugely important, we've decided to save the £20,000 we could have spent at BETT and instead develop more of the Functional maths and Functional English tutorial videos that have been going down so well with out customers.
So no blog reports from me this year. although I can report a very successful show for Guroo, just not BETT.
Our key markets at Guroo Functional Skills are training providers, the larger companies that run their own apprenticeship programmes and the FE sector. All three are well represented here, but BETT is more schools orientated (and much more expensive).
And because keeping our price very competitive is hugely important, we've decided to save the £20,000 we could have spent at BETT and instead develop more of the Functional maths and Functional English tutorial videos that have been going down so well with out customers.
So no blog reports from me this year. although I can report a very successful show for Guroo, just not BETT.
Monday, 21 January 2013
Functional Skills newsletter Jan 22nd, Traineeships, Maths, Moodle, Events and Webinars
January 22nd - the Functional Skills
newsletter
Traineeships were perhaps the most
significant announcement by the Government of the last couple of weeks and we
summarise their potential impact on Functional Skills. We also have a very
interesting summary of the Education Ministers speech about Maths - it's
remarkable how her comments are so close to the fundamental aspects of
Functional Maths.
Many of customers know that Guroo is
based on a Moodle platform so we've added a link to Moodlerooms. We also
have a brief reminder about events and finally this week, the webinar is
all about the brand new reports in Guroo including Progression reports,
something which I know lots of people have requested.
As always, your comments and thoughts
are appreciated - let us know what you'd like us to cover in the newsletter by
emailing the editor - jwells@guroo.co.uk
Traineeships - the details
It looks very likely that these will be
introduced in September. Announced
last week by the Government Minister, Traineeships are for 16-19 year olds who
are not otherwise in full time education, or paid training such as
apprenticeships.
They include three core elements:
They include three core elements:
- Functional Skills - Maths
and English - where the young person has not already achieved
grade C at GCSE
- Intensive work training and/or
work placement
- Other support such as vocational
qualifications adapted to the needs of the individual.
FE Week
carried full details of the Traineeship proposals, so click here for a report of the
Ministers speech
and here for details of the proposals.
Minister’s speech about Maths
In the same week as the announcement
from BIS about Traineeships, we also had the DFE Minister talking about Maths.
A full transcript of Elizabeth Truss speech is available here and it is remarkable how many of the ideas are similar
to those that underpin Functional Maths. For example:
"And,
crucially, we are putting arithmetic, numbers, fractions, decimals and
percentages at the heart of our new curriculum. These essential skills
are the bedrock of the subject, vital for almost every higher-level specialism
and essential if children are to feel confident and capable ..."
"A
vital part of that mastery is practice. The truth is that high-quality,
productive practice is essential in learning any skill .... So pupils need
plenty of opportunities to practise a technique in a wide variety of contexts,
working through increasingly demanding problems on their own and with a
teacher."
"All
the evidence from international tests and league tables suggests that high
performing countries put core academic subjects at the centre of their
curriculum for longer than we do in this country. Nowhere is this more striking
than in 16-18 maths. Last year we announced that maths will be compulsory
for students up to the age of 19 who have not achieved a C at GCSE ? a decision
supported by this week?s Nuffield report."
Better Moodle Experiences
Many readers will know we?re big Moodle
fans at Guroo, with all the initial assessment, diagnostic and resources
content at www.guroo.co.uk and the on-line level checker www.myfunctionalskills.co.uk
being delivered on Moodle that has been adapted by our technical team.
We also know that many folks out there
use Moodle to deliver online components of their courses ? and that it isn?t
easy to keep Moodle running reliably, to make it look the way you want it to,
make it work on mobile devices, mark work efficiently, and more.
So if you?d like to get the best bits
of open source Moodle but would also like better branding, interfaces and course
structures, better reporting, marking, personalised and differentiated learning
? and would like it all to ?just work?, then you should maybe take a look at
Joule from Moodlerooms:
?Joule is an online learning platform
based on Moodle that makes it easy to manage courses and deliver engaging
content and activities to learners, anytime, anyplace. Joule is here to help
you save time and effort and help you meet your learning goals, one lesson at a
time.?
Event Reminders
Implementing Functional Skills in
Birmingham is on this Friday and is targeted at Functional Skills practitioners
and managers and featuring presentations and workshops by experts in Functional
Skills. The event also has all the leading resource providers in
attendance led by Guroo.
Guroo will attend Learning and Skills
show next Tuesday and Wednesday at Olympia in London on stand 213. It's
relevant to the vast majority of our customers in the FE, Adult Learning and
Workplace Learning markets. Because of the clash of dates with the Learning
and Skills show, Guroo will not be at BETT this year.
Wednesday Webinar at 4.00pm
Guroo has been growing recently and
this week we have launched a series of new reports and admin developments.
It's been a while since the Guroo support team had the chance of doing a
webinar, so this week Andy and Simon will be taking you through all the recent
new additions. As always we find that many more people enjoy coming back
for the recording afterwards, but if you'd like to be live, just drop an email
to info@guroo.co.uk
Join us on Wednesday at 4pm.
All previous webinars are recorded and
available anytime for playback - login as a guest and the password is password.
Simply click on the links below and don?t forget, if you?d like to have your
own 1:1 webinar looking at how Guroo can help you support Functional Skills,
just call us on 0191 305 5045 or email info@guroo.co.uk and we?ll take it from there.
Guroo group and user admin
Thursday, 10 January 2013
Traineeships to include Maths and English
Announced today by the Government Minister, Traineeships are for 16-19 year olds who are not otherwise in full time education, or paid training such as apprenticeships.
They include Functional Skills - Maths and English - where the young person has not already achieved grade C at GCSE, intensive work training and work placement and other support such as vocational qualifications adapted to the needs of the individual.
Naturally, Guroo welcomes this valuable new route towards improving standards in Functional Maths and Functional English.
Jonathan Wells
They include Functional Skills - Maths and English - where the young person has not already achieved grade C at GCSE, intensive work training and work placement and other support such as vocational qualifications adapted to the needs of the individual.
Naturally, Guroo welcomes this valuable new route towards improving standards in Functional Maths and Functional English.
Jonathan Wells
Monday, 7 January 2013
Functional Skills newsletter Jan 8th - Events, Ofsted, Progression and Webinars
January 8th - the Functional Skills newsletter
A very happy new year to all our thousands of readers.
January is conference and exhibition season and we have news of two
events - Implementing Functional Skills on Friday 25th January in Birmingham
and the Learning and Skills show on 29/30 at Olympia in London.
We also have news of an Ofsted Review of Apprenticeships that makes
slightly worrying reading, news about Progression Qualifications from OCR (we
like to call them "little bits of Functional Skills") and
details of tomorrow's webinar that will be all about Teaching Functional Maths
and will be centred on Guroo's new tutorial videos.
As always, your comments and thoughts are appreciated - let us know what
you'd like us to cover in the newsletter by emailing the editor - jwells@guroo.co.uk
Event Reminder (1)
Implementing Functional Skills
When: Friday 25th January
Where: Paragon Hotel, Birmingham
Cost: £99
Organised by EMSkills and supported by
(amongst others) Guroo, IQ, Runway Training, West Notts College, Forskills,
Nelson Thornes, Tribal and CIA Training.
Targeted at Functional Skills
practitioners and managers and featuring presentations and workshops by experts
in Functional Skills. The event also has all the leading resource
providers in attendance so you can compare offers from Guroo, BKSB, Forskills
and Tribal.
Event Reminder (2) Learning and
Skills Show
When: Tuesday 29th and Wednesday 30th
January
Where: Olympia, London
Cost: Free to attend exhibition,
various optional workshops and conference options
Attended by the leading providers of
resources in Functional Skills including Guroo (stand 231) Tribal (stand 268).
The BETT show is also on at the same
time and because of the clash of dates, Guroo have chosen to attend Learning
and Skills show which is much more relevant to the vast majority of our
customers in the FE, Adult Learning and Workplace Learning markets rather than
the primary and secondary school focussed BETT show. So if you go to BETT
and can't find Guroo, don't worry, we haven't gone away, just gone somewhere
else!
Ofsted review of Apprenticeships
We picked this up in the DFES Schools
Research Newsletter for December and it makes interesting reading with clearly
lots of issues to be dealt with. The full report and executive summary
can be downloaded from here.
The review highlights issues in several
areas:
- The lead contractor/subcontractor relationship
particularly in areas such as fees where half of lead contractors were
retaining more than the SFA's expected maximum fee of 15%
- A lack of quality assurance by lead
contractors on their sub-contractors
- Too much emphasis on paperwork auditing rather
than improving provision and in some cases, too much emphasis was being
placed on assessment of apprentices rather than their actual learning
A significant number of apprentices
thought they did not have real or sustained employment and did not consider
themselves to be holding a permanent job.
Progression qualifications are
"go"
We saw announcements from a number of
leading awarding bodies about "progression" qualifications – so what
are they?
Well they are aimed at adults and we
like to describe them as "little bits of Functional Skills". To give you a flavour, here's the link to the
OCR Progression Brochure.
Coinciding
with the accreditation of these adult qualifications, Guroo also launched a
series of tutorial videos that mix video teaching with animation and real life
examples that map very nicely to many of the progression qualification areas.
If you'd like to see more of these call Guroo and we'll tell you where
they are on the site or join us tomorrow for a webinar based around these new
tutorial videos.
Wednesday Webinar at 4.00pm
Teaching Functional Maths can be hard
for non-specialist teachers. All the evidence shows that both tutors and
learners can struggle with maths particularly at levels 1 and 2. A series
of brand new tutorial videos are now available from Guroo that cover many of
the key mathematical concepts at from Entry Level 3 to Level 2. They are ideal
for improving the confidence and competence of non-specialist teachers and as a
great learning aid for learners.
Join us on Wednesday at 4pm for a
webinar based around support for Teaching Functional Maths. Just email info@guroo.co.uk for joining information.
All previous webinars are recorded and
available anytime for playback - login as a guest and the password is password.
Simply click on the links below and don’t forget, if you’d like to have your
own 1:1 webinar looking at how Guroo can help you support Functional Skills,
just call us on 0191 305 5045 or email info@guroo.co.uk and we’ll take it from there.
The market continues to change
An announcement today from Pearson saying they are pulling out of the Adult market (through Pearson in Practice) but putting more into the Apprenticeships market through Pearson Work Based Learning. A sign of the times I guess!
Wednesday, 2 January 2013
New features in Guroo
Just sometimes, data collection is a wonderful thing and between September and December 2012, we noticed that the success rate in Maths Functional Skills was significantly below that of English and ICT. We checked with our customers, and indeed with other companies in the sector and sure enough - it's a common problem, learners and tutors alike struggle with Maths Functional Skills with E3 and L1 being the popular area for current achievement.
So we've done something about it at Guroo Functional Skills - developed a series of tutorial videos that focus on different concepts in Functional Maths, typically around Entry Level 3 and Level 1.
So concepts such as conversions, percentages, fractions, probability division and equivalences.
And the next stage is to do the same for some English concepts - we'll start with apostrophes and commas.
Want to know more? Simply call Guroo on 0191 3055045 or goto www.guroo.info and click TRY.
So we've done something about it at Guroo Functional Skills - developed a series of tutorial videos that focus on different concepts in Functional Maths, typically around Entry Level 3 and Level 1.
So concepts such as conversions, percentages, fractions, probability division and equivalences.
And the next stage is to do the same for some English concepts - we'll start with apostrophes and commas.
Want to know more? Simply call Guroo on 0191 3055045 or goto www.guroo.info and click TRY.
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