National strategy for developing numeracy - executive summary

8/7/2019 National strategy for developing numeracy - executive summary

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Meeting the Numeracy

Challenge Executive SummaryA development strategy for numeracy in Adult Basic Education

(01) 855 4332 liter [email protected] www.nala.ie


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Published by

National Adult Literacy Agency

76 Lower Gardiner Street,Dublin 1.

2004 National Adult Literacy Agency

The copyright in this report belongs to

the National Adult Literacy Agency.

Meeting the Numeracy ChallengeMeeting the Numeracy Challenge


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Introduction

The NALA mission statement is to ensure

all adults with literacy difficulties have

access to high quality learning

opportunities. In working towards this

mission, one of the objectives identified by

our members and included in our

Strategic Plan 20022006 is to develop

and promote a dedicated numeracystrategy for I reland2.

I n the Autumn of 2002, as a starting

point in producing i ts dedicated

Numeracy Strategy and Development

Plan, NALA car r ied out an audi t of

cur rent numeracy provision in ABE

settings in I reland.

NALA also put together a working group

comprising representatives of relevantstakeholders, with a brief to look at and

report on current adult numeracy issues,

and to produce a proposed strategic plan

for adult numeracy. The group met

monthly from December 2002 through to

May 2003.

This resulting report discusses the

findings of the recent NALA adult

numeracy survey in the context of theissues it raises for adult numeracy

provision.

Definition of Numeracy

The working group looked at a number

of definitions of numeracy and numerate

behaviour fr om across the world, and

then proposed its own definition, as

follows:

Numeracy is a lifeskill that involves

the competent use of mathematical

language, knowledge and skills.

Numerate adults have the confidence

to manage the mathematical

demands of real-life situations such

as everyday living, work-related

settings and in further education,

so that effective choices are made in

our evolving technological and

knowledge-based society.

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Executive Summary

2 NALA will: develop and promote a dedicated numeracy strategy(The National Adult Literacy Agency, Strategic Plan 20022006, Step 6, p17).


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International developmentsand practice in adult numeracy

The Adult Literacy and Life skills (ALL)

Survey that is currently taking place

internationally (Ireland is notparticipating), is a follow-up to the

International Adult L iteracy Survey (IALS)

which did include I reland and which was

carried out in 1997 by the Education

Research Centre in co-operation with the

Organisation for Economic Cooperation

and Development (OECD).

The ALL survey will explicit ly survey the

numeracy abilities of adults (the survey

also includes Document and Prose

Literacy and problem solving). I t is a

comparative sur vey that is being jointly

developed by Statistics Canada and by

the United States National Centre for

Education Statistics (NCES), in

cooperation with the OECD.

The countries with the most interesting

developments in adult numeracy outside

I reland are Australia, Canada, Denmark,the United Kingdom and the USA. The

repor t describes these developments in

some detail3, and summarises them as

follows:

1. AustraliaI t may be seen that Australia has a well-

developed provision for numeracy, which

incorporates professional development for

the tutors in the field. This level of

provision has been achieved despite the fact

that numeracy continues to be defined

within literacy in the body of national policy

documentation.

2. BritainBr itain has recognised the impor tance of

build ing up the numeracy capabil ity in

the population and has also recognised

that the foundation for this objective is

set in the ear ly school years. I t i s the only

country which has put in place a

numeracy curriculum that extends

throughout all levels of the education

system.

3. CanadaI n Canada adult numeracy is more

developed in some areas than others, with

Ontario leading the way. Their integrated

basic skills programme includes numeracy

with an emphasis on skills-based

outcomes. There are also national Skills

profiles related to 150 occupations and

these include a numeracy element.

4. DenmarkThe approach taken in Denmark has

been to address defini tion, cur r iculum

and professional development

simultaneously, in a single concentrated

and ambitious phase of development. No

other country has been so coherent in its

evolution of numeracy provision.

5. USAThere is no national policy on numeracy

in the USA, but a Framework for Adult

Numeracy Standards was published by

the National I nstitute for L iteracy in

1996. This identifies seven themes

essential to adult mathematical li teracy

and supports four key purposes for

numeracy learning as identified by adult

learners. Two interesting supportorganisations exist: the Making Math Real

I nstitute (MMRI) in Pennsylvania support

tutors who lack confidence in their own

Maths skills; and the Adult Numeracy

Network (ANN) supports numeracy

tutors whilst also aiming to influence

policy and practice.

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Research on international developments by kind permission of Terry Maguir e and the University ofLimerick (taken from Engendering Numeracy in Adult Mathematics Education with a Focus on Tutors:A Grounded Approach Maguir e, unpublished PhD, U niversity of L imerick, May 2003).


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Adult Numeracyin Ireland National policyand practice

Background andGovernment PolicyI n I reland, adult numeracy is explicit ly

contained with in NALAs defin it ion of

adult literacy, and therefore is implicitly

represented within all of the aims,

objectives and action steps in the NALA

Str ategic Plan 20022006. Developing a

numeracy strategy is also one of the core

objectives of this Strategic Plan.

The Governments Green Paper Adul t

Education in an Era of L ifelong Learning

(1998), similar ly states, I n keeping with

existing practice in the literacy services

and the scope of the I nternational Adul t

Literacy Survey, any reference to literacy

in this paper should be interpreted as

cover ing numeracy ski lls also. I t also

adds, Tackling low li teracy/numeracy

levels must rank as the pr imary adulteducation pr iori ty in I reland.4

Numeracy is also contained within the

adult li teracy agenda of the new National

Adult Literacy Programme, and

workplace numeracy is specifically

mentioned within the Tackling

Educational Disadvantage Special

I nitiative of the Governments new

national Social Partnership Agreement

for 20032005, Sustaining Progress(2003)5.

Adult numeracy provisionAt present in I reland, adult numeracy is

being delivered within both VEC literacy

schemes and other ABE settings, and has

been incorporated in most aspects of

adult li teracy provision promotion,

training, tuition, regional and national

forums, distance learning

(Time4Learning radio programme), the

NALA Quality Framework and the NALA

Assessment Framework.

The cur rent situation benefits from the

extensive nature of the range of

provision that is offered by the different

organisations that are working to meetthe needs of adul t learners. H owever

there is a serious lack of consistency in

the level and quality of numeracy

provision nationally.

A contributing factor is the lack of a unified

concept of numeracy amongst service

providers, who are not operating to a

generally agreed vision or concept of

numeracy in the context of ABE in I reland.

I t is important that a consistency ofapproach is applied across the ABE sector

and that service providers have a clear,

national definit ion of numeracy to follow in

providing numeracy services and when

interpreting published government policy

documents.

A partial picture of the actual type and

extent of cur rent provision is to be found

in the findings of the NALA AdultNumeracy survey which are given in Part

3 of the full report.

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Adult Education in an Era of L ifelong Learning, Government of I reland, November 1998,pp68695 Sustaining Progress, Social Partnership Agreement 2003-2005, Chapter 2, Section 2.8, p30.


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Tutor trainingThe White Paper in Adult Education

(Department of Education and Science,

2000) recognised the need to have a

highly trained corps of adult educators6

to underpin the Adult Education sector

in I reland. I t is in fact widely accepted

that adult numeracy tutors have a vital

contribution to make in raising the level

of numeracy of the adult population.

There is now a significant amount of in-

service numeracy training available for

tutors via NALA, and this is increasing all

the time, including new numeracy

workshops and training for working withNumeracy and Farming.

There is also accredited tutor training in

numeracy through NALA/WIT, and in

fact the numeracy module from WI T was

the second module to be made generally

available as a single certificate and is now

the thi rd most popular course.

H owever, as the find ings of the NAL A

numeracy survey in Part 3 of the fullreport clearly show, there is a need to

further develop numeracy training in

order to satisfy tutor training needs.

These developments need to take into

account the fact that some ABE settings

are not part of the NALA membership

and therefore may not be able to access

training as easily as those who are

members.

Awareness and profile of adultnumeracyFor various reasons, numeracy does not

have as high a profile as other parts of

adult literacy, and awareness levels

amongst ABE providers, adult literacy

tutors and the general public would seem

to be comparatively low.

I ncreased promotion of adul t numeracy

is therefore needed, and this should be

targeted at providers, tutors and adult

learners.

Extent of current adult numeracyproblemThere are no separate figures for

numeracy within the Department of

Education and Sciences statistics for

adult literacy, and therefore no

comprehensive accurate up-to-date

statistics on the cur rent adult numeracy

provision in I reland or the actual

number of adult numeracy learners.

The recent NALA adult numeracy survey

results give an incomplete picture, as the

survey reached just over 400 providers

out of whom only 121 (just over 25%)

responded. Also no defin it ion of adul t

numeracy was given out with the sur vey

questionnaire. This means that,

inevitably, respondents would have had

varied understanding of the meaning

and contexts for numeracy and how thisdiffers from basic maths.

This fact does not however negate the

findings of the survey and the issues

these findings raise for the future

development of adult numeracy in

Ireland.

Findings of the NALA adultnumeracy survey

This part of the full report gives an

outline of the present situation r egarding

adult numeracy in I reland, based on the

recent NALA numeracy survey.

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6 Learning For L ife: White Paper on Adult Education , Government of I reland, July 2000, p150.


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Research methodology usedin the survey

This adult numeracy survey, and its use

as part of the formulation of NALAs

adult numeracy strategy, was informed bymembers and stakeholders in the

following ways:

G The init ial idea for the numeracy

strategy came from the NALA

membership.G The numeracy sur vey

questionnaire was sent to over 400

organisations from adult literacy

and other ABE settings.G Key stakeholders were repr esented

on the NALA numeracy working

group.

This repor t will also be disseminated to

all NALA members and key stakeholders

in adult literacy and numeracy in

Ireland.

Survey recipients

The survey questionnaire was sent to allVEC Adult Literacy Schemes and to a

range of other ABE settings, including

Youthr each, Community Training

Workshops, N TDI centr es, Training

Centres, VTOS centres and Prison

Education Units. Just over 400

questionnaires were sent out..

Survey respondents

The number of questionnaires returned

was 121. These were made up of:

G VEC Adult Literacy schemes 62G Other ABE settings 59

N Youthr each 17N NT DI 10N Community Training Workshops

(CTWs) 8N Training Centres 7N VTOS 7N Prisons 6N Other 4

The findings are presented in terms ofthe issues they raised:G AwarenessG Tutor resourcesG Tutor trainingG Provision of tuitionG Learner participationG Numeracy contentG AssessmentG AccreditationG

MaterialsG PromotionG Development needs

Recommendations

Recommendations for development

arising from the survey findings are

included at the end of each of the

relevant sections of the full report.

A complete List of Recommendations ,

based on both the survey findings andother research carried out by the

working group, is also to be found in the

full report.

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Conclusion

Although there is alr eady a signif icant

amount of adult numeracy provision

within adult literacy schemes and other

adult basic education settings, there is aneed at present to raise awareness of

numeracy and give it a higher profile

within adult li teracy in I reland. This

mir rors simi lar exper ience and

developments in other countr ies, which

are at varying stages of this process.

Research into international developments

has shown that approaches to defining

and delivering adult numeracy have

varied widely and that adult numeracy asa whole is still in an early stage of

development.

Approaches that have shown some

noticeable benefits internationally include

the following:

G a clear definition of adult

numeracy, based on the real needs

of adults at this time;

G an integrated li felong learningapproach to numeracy provision,

looking at educational needs from

school through to adult learning;G a methodology for the delivery of

adult numeracy provision, based

on an agreed definition of

numeracy;G an accessible, high quality tutor

training programme for adult

numeracy tutors;G a national core cur r iculum for

adult numeracy;G networking opportunities for adult

numeracy tutors;G a range of appropriate adult

numeracy resource materials.

Within I reland, there has alr eady been

some progress in integrating adult

numeracy into core adult literacy and

other ABE provision, including

workplace literacy, family literacy and

intensive literacy programmes. There ismuch to be said for encouraging further

integration of numeracy in this way.

H owever, there is also a proven need to

promote awareness of adult numeracy in

its own right, so that there is a greater

understanding of what numeracy means,

and its importance in the quality of adult

lives. T his awareness-raising for ABE

providers and other relevantorganisations, and for potential tutors

and learners, needs to take place

nationally, regionally and locally.

Addi tional resources are also required, in

order to develop the capacity for both a

suitably trained cohort of adult numeracy

tutors and a wide range of accessible

quality numeracy provision. These need

to be backed up by an increased amount

of r esource materials and networking foradult numeracy tutors.

These developments will enable adult

learners to develop their numeracy

capacity and numerate behaviour within

a variety of contexts, whether at work, at

home, in a social context or within

further education. This in turn will lead

to increased competence in the many

areas of life that involve some form ofnumeracy, and a growing self-confidence

among learners in their own abilities.

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The potential benefits in terms of

personal empowerment and active

citizenship are significant, and it is hoped

that some of the positive effects of an

enhanced numeracy pr ovision wil l be:

G reduced inequalities in learning

opportunities;G less social exclusion;G sustained economic

competitiveness.

The NALA Adult Numeracy Strategy

20032006 puts in place a development

plan for actions that will both raise

awareness levels and achieve success in

fur ther developing adult numeracyprovision in line with the

recommendations of this report. I t is

hoped that the necessary resources can

be put in place to deliver the full strategy

and its benefits.

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Development WorkerG Create role of NALA Numeracy

Development Worker, either as a

new post or within capacity of

existing development work roles.

(NALA)

Tutor trainingG I nclude numeracy as an explicit

and integral part of all initial

training of adult literacy tutors,

and have this initial numeracy

training at local level accredited

appropriately. (VECs/ABE

providers/NALA)G Establish a numeracy training

programme development group,

via the Training Advisory Group,

to r eview train ing needs and

fur ther develop a nationally

recognised, accessible numeracy

tutor training programme. (NALA)

Resource materialsG Review numeracy resources that

are currently available nationally

and internationally, and pr ior it ise

key areas for research and

development. (NALA)G H ave a numeracy specialist on the

new NALA materials working

group and editor ial group. (NALA)G Produce a basic resource package

for adult numeracy. (NALA

materials working group)G Provide a methodology and

support for the development of a

range of resource materials,

including computer software,

appropriate for different ability

levels and target groups. (NALA

materials working group)

Integration of numeracyinto all adult literacy andABE provision

G Fur ther develop the integration of

numeracy into all adult literacy

and other ABE provision, e.g. core

provision, workplace literacy,

family literacy and intensiveli teracy programmes. (NALA,

VECs, ABE providers)

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List of Recommendations7(Suggested responsibilities in parentheses)

7 Note: This is the complete list of recommendations. T hese recommendations also appear with in thereport, attached to the relevant section for the issue or issues concerned. Some of the

recommendations appear more than once within the report.Many of the recommendations are also di rectly linked to the action steps set out in the proposedNALA Adult Numeracy Strategy, which is included in this report.


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NetworkingG Facil itate and suppor t an adult

numeracy network, such that

organisers and tutor s can exchange

ideas and resources. (NALA websiteand fora)

G Facilitate regular adult numeracy

network events at regional and

national level. (NALA fora)

Assessment and accreditationG Provide an enhanced NALA

assessment fr amework for adult

numeracy, with a number of stages

below foundation level. (NALA)G Establish a nationally accredi ted

adult numeracy core cur r iculum as

part of an adult literacy curriculum

which is linked to the new NALA

Assessment Framework.

(NALA/FETAC working group)G Develop nationally recognised

certification in adult numeracy.

(NALA/FETAC working group)

G Produce a clear path ofprogression options for adult

numeracy, including the option of

accreditation at a national level.

(NALA/FETAC)

Awareness and promotionG Devise and deliver a specif ic

Numeracy Awareness Training

programme that can also be

adapted for incorporation as anintegral part of a revised Literacy

Awareness Training programme

(NALA)G I ncrease resources for adult

numeracy, to integrate numeracy

into other li teracy and ABE

provision, and to make it clear that

numeracy is par t of their provision.

(VECs/ABE providers)

G Devise a promotional strategy that

will appeal to the real needs and

interests of potential adult

numeracy learners, as well as

allaying any fears that they may

have concerning their previousexperiences of maths (NALA)

G Provide pr omotional material and

methods specifically to attract new

adult numeracy tutors both

nationally and at a regional and

local level (NALA)G Specif ically promote adult

numeracy to parents through

schools, as an aid to helping

children with their mathshomework. (VECs/ABE providers)

G Carry out a high-profile national

campaign to promote adult

numeracy pr ovision, at such a time

as resources are sufficient to cover

potential demand. (NALA)

Monitoring of provisionG Collect and record adult numeracy

statistics as a separate item within

the overall data for adult literacy.

(Department of Education and

Science/VECs/ABE providers)

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(01) 855 4332 liter [email protected] www.nala.ie

National Adu lt Literacy Agency

76 Lower Gar diner Street

Dublin 1

NALA Cork

c/o VTSU Bu ildin g

Tramore Road

Cork

Ph one: (021) 4317011

Fax: (021) 431 5054

Email: [email protected]

NALA Mullingar

Education & Employment Centr e

Austin Friar Street

Mullingar

Co Westmeath

Ph one: (044) 42111

Fax: (044) 45834

Email: pkiern [email protected]

I n the Autumn of 2002, as a starting point in producing its dedicated

Numeracy Strategy and Development Plan, NALA car r ied out an audit of

cur rent numeracy provision in ABE settings in I reland. NALA also put

together a working group comprising representatives of relevant stakeholders,

with a brief to look at and report on current adult numeracy issues, and toproduce a proposed strategic plan for adult numeracy. This resulting report

discusses the findings of the recent NALA adult numeracy survey in the

context of the issues it raises for adult numeracy provision.

National strategy for developing numeracy - executive summary

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