Numeracy for adults: building skills with online learning links

3. The context of numeracy learning

The Building and Construction Industry Training Organisation (BCITO) is the organisation appointed by the Government to develop and implement industry qualifications for the building and construction sector. As such, they directly face the challenges involved when workers with low numeracy levels are working towards industry standard qualifications.

The researchers worked directly with the BCITO to analyse and describe the context for numeracy learning within one of their certificate-level qualifications. The level 2 and 3 concrete qualifications were selected as a focus as they were currently under review.

The main method of instruction within the concrete qualifications entails apprentices working through workbook tasks. Workbooks contain all the information apprentices are required to learn, and are set out in unit standards, each of which focuses on a different aspect of the course. Each unit standard presents the necessary theoretical information for apprentices to read, and then sets out a number of related tasks, some of which are used for assessment purposes. In general, apprentices complete workbook tasks independently, outside of work hours, and if they have difficulty can consult their employer or a BCITO Training Advisor for assistance.

The BCITO employs Training Advisors to monitor the qualifications within the industry and these people were surveyed to further understand the place of numeracy within the concrete qualifications. Results showed that each advisor was responsible for approximately 120 apprentices on average, with the majority of apprentices (90 percent) coming from the carpentry sector. In general, advisors visited each apprentice about four times a year, and spent approximately an hour with the apprentice at each visit. Training advisors reported that they filled a wide variety of roles to support apprentices but considered monitoring apprentices’ progress on the qualification to be their most important role. Other tasks identified as important were moderating assessments, assisting apprentices to complete workbook tasks, checking work logs, and pastoral care.

Advisors reported using mostly informal strategies such as discussion and observation to identify apprentices having difficulty with numeracy. Key observations reported as indicating difficulties with numeracy were incomplete maths units, or apprentices’ experiencing difficulty in working on these units. The three numeracy tasks most commonly identified by advisors as difficult for apprentices were performing calculations without a calculator, estimating and measuring angles, and calculating values using formulae.

Most advisors were positive about the proposal to use online tools to support apprentices in developing numeracy skills. The majority of advisors (77 percent) thought the learning links approach would be moderately or very useful. Some advisors expressed concern about student motivation and access to online resources.

In discussion with the BCITO, two employers were invited to participate in the research. They each identified a group of target workers for the case studies. This group comprised five workers in the concrete trade: two were working on concrete qualifications with the BCITO, though not attending training courses, and three were not currently enrolled in courses but were considered to be representative of concrete workers in general. As these workers were not being actively supported to meet the numeracy demands of either the qualifications they were working towards or the workplace more generally, they were ideal participants to trial the online approach. All five of these case study participants will be referred to as workers throughout the remainder of this report.