Monday, 30 March 2009

Employability Skills

It's a one of those "duh" moments.
Piece in the TES saying that Colleges should teach employability skills such as time keeping, dress codes and working in a team.
Let me just re-iterate that once a student has passed the basic qualification bar, enthusiasm and attitude are what employers seek and that isn't very different from those employability skills.




Wednesday, 25 March 2009

Past Papers from AQA?

Here's an absoute stunner for all of us who spend our lives thinking and working in Functional Skills.

QCA insist that testing in Functional Skills "WILL NOT BE MULTIPLE CHOICE"

AQA on 4th March 09 update their web site and the latest speciman (note the term) is certainly not that but everything referred to as a past paper is multiple choice!  Even worse, the latest specimen papers are at the bottom of the screen and need a scroll down to be seen.

Just let me climb up onto my soap box here and then tell the AQA to get their act together. Leaving past papers on your site based on multiple choice quiestions confuses the bigger issue and does no-one - particularly the teachers - any favours at all.

The majority of teachers that I talk to relish the chance to do some proper teaching in Functional Skills and welcome the fact the the move away from exam factory is to be celebrated!

This made me smile

Something in the Evening Chronicle made me smile today.

A Newcastle United fan who ran onto the pitch after Cisse scored for Sunderland and subsequently begged to be barred from the ground has instead been told he has to keep going!

His lawyer said her client’s outburst and actions happened because of the Magpies’ plight.  And in what I think is a very funny quote said

“I don’t know very much about football but I understand he isn’t alone in that feeling at the moment"

I guess you would therefore say that being made to go is more of  a punishment that being kept away!


Wednesday, 11 March 2009

Shocking stats - one quarter of one percent!

The Daily Mail does have a history of stirring up "Middle England" and this isn't the sort of story that I would expect them to run normally but it is relevant and pretty shocking.

Of the 75,000 children on free school meals each year, just 189 of them went onto get 3 A levels at grade A.  That is one quarter of 1%.  OK, Daily Mail style meant they compared this with the 67% at a top indepdndent school that got 3 A grades but in my view the real story is the shocking statistic of one quarter of one percent.

"The system fails children from poorer backgrounds" - a very fair quote I would say given the results.  

 

Thursday, 5 March 2009

The Game Show Quiz

I had the priveldge of being asked to do a little session at the naace conference this week - naturally it was about Functional Skills.

The issue was how do I come up with something that isn't powerpoint, that doesn't overtly mention Guroo but is informative and entertaining.

The solution was provided by Stewart, my co-director who came up with the quiz show format and Vicki who produced an amazing set of Smart Board resources to use.  And it worked, in fact it worked so well that we've had requests to repeat it which we're happy to do so long as we can fit it in neatly and the audience is right.

So if you want to know a bit more about Functional Skills and you like things like Boockbusters, and Family Fortunes - you know where to find us.


Monday, 2 March 2009

Teachers lack of awareness

We're used to some negative reporting about the Diplomas and indeed, my contention remains that they are badly positioned by the Government and QCA.

What's really worrying about the Ofsted survey is the lack of awareness by teachers has not moved forward at all during a whole year.  Surely, this must tell someone something about positioning.