Category: Literacy

Parent Zone – Education Scotland Website

Literacy is important in all areas of learning. Being able to read and write accurately, to listen carefully and to talk clearly about ideas will increase the opportunities for young people in all aspects of life and will allow them to participate fully in learning and later in a work environment.

Parents play a crucial role in helping children to develop literacy skills from an early age. They contribute to this by reading to their children every day, learning nursery rhymes together and using normal events in life to help children learn about the world around them, for example by pointing out signs. Parents can contribute further to their children’s learning by encouraging children to talk about their thoughts and ideas, and about how they are feeling. Parents can encourage children to explore literacy outside the classroom.

Young people will enjoy reading different types of texts and all reading helps them to develop their skills. So whether they are reading a book, a blog, a magazine or a sports report, it will help if parents are encouraging and supportive.

This website has lots of ideas and links through to other websites to help parents and carers support their children with literacy at home.

Fun with Writing

The 50 Word Writing Competition.

Each month, the Scottish Book Trust runs a fantastic writing competition. This competition is open to all young learners up to the age of 18.

Young writers are asked to write 50 words inspired by a photograph or a theme or a title.

Further information can be found at the Scottish Book Trust’s website:

http://www.scottishbooktrust.com/writing/love-to-write/the-50-word-fiction-competition

Parent/ Infant relationships – Suzanne Zeedyk

Suzanne Zeedyk is currently Senior Lecturer in Developmental Psychology at Dundee University. Suzanne’s work focuses on parent-infant relationships. She is frequently invited to speak to groups of parents and professionals on the importance of such relationships, and how babies’ early experiences influence the development of their brain, bodies and psyche.

For more information, please visit the following website: http://www.educationscotland.gov.uk/earlyyears/prebirthtothree/nationalguidance/conversations/suzannezeedyk.asp

Adult Family Learning

 

Throughout the course of 2013 Scotland’s Learning Partnership has been writing a series of papers designed to generate discussion and debate by and between those involved in the delivery of various aspects of lifelong learning in Scotland. In this Family Learning Document they highlight and discuss key issues around the meaning of family learning in Scotland and raise awareness of some of the main thinkers in the family learning field. 

More information can be found at: http://www.salp.org.uk/

Skilled for Life?

This first OECD Skills Outlook presents the initial results of the Survey of Adult Skills (PIACC), which evaluates the skills of adults in 22 OECD member countries and two partner countries. The survey was designed to provide insights into the availability of some key skills and how they are used at work and at home through the direct assessment of key information processing skills: literacy, numeracy and problem-solving in technology-rich environments. The book examines the social and economic context, the supply of key information processing skills, who has these skills at what level, the supply of and demand for these skills in the labour market, the acquisition and maintenance of skills over a lifetime, and how proficiency in these skills translates into better economic and social outcomes.

The presentation can be viewed by clicking on this hyperlink.

OECD Survey of Adult Skills

The ‘basic skills’ of literacy and numeracy are among the most fundamental attributes of human beings and their civilization, lying at the root of our capacity to communicate and live and work together, to develop and share knowledge, science and culture. Their contribution to workforce skills have increasingly been recognized as critical to economic success, while evidence on gaps in adult basic skills and the link with economic and social outcomes has also been growing, both at national and international level (e.g. International Survey of Adult Skills of 1994-98 and Adult Literacy and Life Skills Survey of 2003-2007). Most tellingly, there has been a belated realization that despite universal basic education in advanced countries, some adults have slipped through the net, leaving them with very weak literacy and numeracy. All of these factors underline the importance of the OECD’s new international Survey of Adult Skills.

This report on skills in the US draws out the policy implications of the Survey for the US, while also making use of some additional data collected for the Survey on the US alone. The study does not directly evaluate relevant US policies and programs – such as schooling and adult education. Instead it identifies in the results of the Survey some key lessons about the strategic objectives and directions which should form a frame for policy development in the US, including policy on adult learning and schooling.

Click on this link to access slideshow with findings.