'One size does not fit all’: how five tertiary education organisations embed literacy, language and numeracy: summary report

6. Industry Training Organisation case study

The integrated workplace learning project

The ITO identified shortcomings in LLN skills among support workers as barriers to their completing their base qualifications. The ITO sought and gained funding from the Tertiary Education Commission to develop the Integrated Workplace Learning Project,which included 34 providers, five of whom were surveyed. This project aimed to help support trainees with their workplace literacy demands while they were also completing an industry-specific national certificate, and sought to support employers and workplaces to begin to understand and address workplace literacy needs.

The case found general agreement among participants that embedding literacy in workplace training was important, worked well and was sustainable, even though it also faced some challenges. The philosophy underpinning the project is captured by the following statements:

We don’t have one model; we try to keep it personalised. There are some commonalities on what seems to work, but we keep personalising it.

I think embedding literacy ... is putting the trainee or learner in a situation whereby they feel empowered to be actually able to engage in the topic, think through it, learn a little bit more as they go along and then actually relate it back to their work.

We want a sustainable model of teaching and learning ... around literacy that we can embed into our programme and develop our support workers into becoming more independent learners, to have more confidence around language and reading and then thinking about that reading and what it means to them in terms of their practice and how they can translate their knowledge into practical skills.

The ITO provided the vision and organisation behind the project. Individual providers are fully supportive of embedded LLN and are developing learning cultures that focus on successful outcomes for learners in both LLN and vocational qualifications. Adult education principles underpin practice, a view of literacy as social practice is evident in the focus on both work and life skills, and both learners and trainers are well supported. The following summarises the data:

• Embedding literacy in workplaces is championed from within the ITO.
• Workplaces also have LLN champions seeking to create learning organisations to support their employees.
• All sites recognise the importance of identifying, supporting and developing LLN needs of employees while at the same time upskilling employees in workplace practice.
• There is a broad understanding of the nature of LLN. This aligns well with the wider communication needs of individuals, including critical thinking, and not just reading and writing.
• Workplaces are reviewing their own internal resources through the learning from this project and employees voice their opinions with confidence on what could be improved.
• Workplaces agree that the ITO model being implemented is sustainable. The professional development approach (literacy tutors, educational qualifications, workshops, trainers’ resource folder, improvement of workbooks) is seen as effective.
• Group training is seen as a good model for developing social practices and supporting cross-cultural needs.
• Trainers are beginning to shift their teacher-directed training to a constructivist and learner-centred approach.
• Organisations notice improvement in employees’ confidence, quality of workplace practice and desire for ongoing learning.