Friday, 29 July 2011
EBacc subjects high on the list of student choices
Originally a question, a year later, it's now a statement. The press, including the BBC are reporting that secondary schools are pressuring students into choosing subjects that form the basis of the EBacc. The next curriculum year also sees the new maths and English GCSE curriculum first exams which has far more functional skills related content. I'm keen to see how well students do.
Friday, 22 July 2011
League Tables
Over the last few days we've seen various proposals by the Government about league tables. They suggest that new league tables should not included anything below a full GCSE - what about Functional Skills?
It doesn't meet a number of objectives such as being 1/2 a GCSE (not a full one) and not having grades (a requirement of qualifications that are included in the league table).
Does this mean that the 50% of 16 year olds who do not pass grade C GCSE in both maths and English are to be ignored? That's not quite what Wolf said is it? It also means that qualifications such as Apprenticeships would be deemed worthless by the Government - can't be right!
We have a chance to comment though, it's just a proposal with a consultation period so if you feel strongly, please make your feelings known.
Monday, 18 July 2011
Functional Skills Annual Survey
July 19th - the Functional Skills newsletter
Just one item in this last newsletter of the curriculum year - the 2010/11 Annual Survey.
We have created a 5 minute survey about Functional Skills through Survey Monkey. You may already have received a direct link and answered, if so, there is no need to do it again. If you haven't received a survey response request, please click the link below or copy into your browser.
https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/DGX3HPF
Thursday, 14 July 2011
Guroo shortlisted for national education award
Very pleased and indeed very proud to say that Guroo has been shortlisted for the best use of educational technology at the Education Investor national awards.
The winners are announced on 17th November at the Dorchester.
We're up against some illustrious competitors though including Espresso, Pearson, Promethean, Uniservity and Frog.
Not bad at all for a little north east based company developing resources for Functional Skills!
Thursday, 7 July 2011
Performance Measures for schools
The Telegraph today carries more details about how Michael Gove is thinking about performance measures.
It does just seem like an ever so sensible solution in my view especially as one of the measures will be Functional Skills.
Monday, 4 July 2011
Functional Skills Newsletter July 5th
July 5th - the Functional Skills newsletter
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Initial Assessment Tool for Functional Skills
Edexcel have developed an Initial Assessment Tool (IAT) to provide a simple way of helping teachers and tutors to screen a learner's existing skills and give an indication of their functionality in Functional English reading and Functional Mathematics from Entry Level 1 up to Level 2.
The BETA test version is now online - try it now on the Pearson website.
Edexcel are keen to get a range of views on the tool – in particular, they are asking for your help with testing, so your feedback can help them shape future improvements, in particular:
- How do you use the Initial Assessment Tool?
- What changes and improvements would you like to see?
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Guroo 2.0 enhancements and developments
There's such a lot been happening over the past few weeks, we thought it would be worthwhile letting our readers know about all the additions and changes.
Learners Personal Reports now allows a learner to keep track of all their progress and results in one easy place including assignment grades, myFS results and quiz marks. We've also changed the process so that each quiz attempt can now be revisited giving feedback on answers a learner has submitted.
A messaging system has been added that allows learner to tutor and tutor to learner messaging (but not learner to learner). Great for distance learning and homework and works especially well when used with task setting.
On-line interactive tasks have been added to all the following challenges
- English Entry 1 Face Off
- English Entry 1 New York, New York
- Maths Entry 1 Up To You
- Maths Entry 1 Be Patient
- ICT Entry 1 Blog It!
- English Entry 2 New York, New York
- Maths Entry 2 Up To You
- ICT Entry 2 Mum's The Word
- Cross Curricular Entry 2 Fashion Parade
- Cross Curricular Entry 2 Eating Out
- Cross Curricular Entry 3 Fashion Parade
- Cross Curricular Entry 3 Eating Out
- Cross Curricular Level 1 The Long Way Home
- Cross Curricular Level 2 The Long Way Home
- Cross Curricular Level 1 Beautiful View
- Cross Curricular Level 2 Beautiful View
We've also started adding on-line quizzes to all the cross curricular challenges which will add a further 1400 Functional Skills questions to the Guroo 2.0 service by September.
Press review for June
According to the TES, the top 3 needs of business leaders are:
- High standards of English and maths
- Skills to think in different ways
- The ability to distinguish good evidence from bad in the Google age
An interesting discussion led by education journalist Warwick Mansell and hosted by Pearson about on-line testing and standards. Catch the summary and videos here.
CBI remain concerned about Numeracy standards with the Minister pledging to put maths back at the heart of the curriculum for all students up to age 18.
GCSEs to fall into line with Functional Skills as modular courses are replaced with end of year exams.
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Links to all the Awarding Organisations Functional Skills pages
Following a number of requests to help with curriculum planning, we have been asked to repeat this item featured in the last newsletter. We have done our best to get as close as possible to the Functional Skills part of the each website below.
AQA - all subjects and all levels
Acentis - all subjects and all levels
City and Guilds - all subjects and all levels
Skillsfirst/EAL/IMI consortium - All subjects at levels 1&2
EDI - all subjects and all levels
Edexcel - all subjects and all levels
NCFE - all subjects and all levels
NOCN - all subjects and all levels
OCR - all subjects and all levels
SQA - English and maths levels 1&2
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Please Plus One us on Google follow us on Twitter @guroofs and like us on Facebook at guroo.functionalskills. The last newsletter is likely to be Tuesday July 19th - if you have anything you'd like us to know about, just get in touch jwells@guroo.co.uk
Friday, 17 June 2011
Functional Skills newsletter June 21st
June 21st - the Functional Skills newsletter
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"A 75min exam with two questions? Are you serious?"
Our lead piece this week has been chosen to reflect a concern that has cropped up quite a number of times on Twitter; how students are being prepared for their Functional Skills exams. The title quote is from a student on Twitter from 4pm on June 15th after the exam.
On the same day I personally took a call quite late in the evening from a student (let’s call her Helen) who had bought access to www.myguroo.co.uk so she could practice and revise for her Functional Skills English Level 2 exams in a weeks time.
Me Good afternoon Guroo!
Helen I’ve just bought the cram4exam access for English and I want my money back
Me Oh, why is that?
Helen Because I’ve just been on the quizzes and they aren’t multiple choice
Me They aren’t meant to be - so what’s the problem?
Helen My teacher told me to go on Bitesize, Move On and Key Skills 4u to revise for Functional Skills and they are all multiple choice so yours must be wrong
Me No, we are right, your teacher shouldn’t really be telling you to practice Functional Skills using Key Skills resources because they are so different. Anyone expecting their Functional Skills exam to be a series of multiple choice questions is going to be in for a shock.
Helen So how do I revise then?
Me Tackle the Guroo Challenges - you can do them on paper or on-line
Helen But they all ask me to write loads
Me Yes .......
Helen And They're hard and take a while to do
Me Yes ……
Helen Is there not somewhere else I can go that just does multiple choice questions like Bitesize?
We strongly believe that students should not be preparing for Functional Skills exams by doing multiple choice tests designed for Key Skills. It's just wrong!
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Links to AO past papers
In the last newsletter we highlighted the annual qualifications market report from Ofqual. This generated lots of discussion and more questions including many requests for links to the AO Functional Skills sites. We have done our best to get as close as possible to the Functional Skills part of the each website below.
AQA - all subjects and all levels
Acentis - all subjects and all levels
City and Guilds - all subjects and all levels
Skillsfirst/EAL/IMI consortium - All subjects at levels 1&2
EDI - all subjects and all levels
Edexcel - all subjects and all levels
NCFE - all subjects and all levels
NOCN - all subjects and all levels
OCR - all subjects and all levels
SQA - English and maths levels 1&2
WJEC - all subjects and all levels
The Ofqual full report can be accessed here with the section on Functional Skills starting on page 63.
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A Challenge from Guroo!
Got an idea for a great Functional Skills practise scenario? We’d love to hear about it.
We’re inviting newsletter readers to help us design a new Guroo Challenge, covering all three subjects and adaptable for use at all 5 levels.
We'll do the work to produce the content; but we need your ideas for scenarios. Naturally, we will give you equal "billing and credit" in the finished item, and we'll make the resulting Challenge available to the whole Functional Skills community free of charge.
Our plan is to develop them over the next few months and launch them at BETT in January 2012.
So if you have a great idea for a new Challenge , especially if it addresses some of the harder to teach skills criteria, then email jwells@guroo.co.uk or call me on 0191 3055045 for a chat.
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Enhancing Literacy and Numeracy conference - Next steps for SfL and Functional Skills - July 6th in London.
A quick reminder about this conference due to take place next month in London.
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