Category Archives: Skills Training Programmes

My Purple Cow is a Red Rabbit

Posted in Adult Learning, Blog creation, Editing and proofreading, academic editing, thesis editing, literary editing, Education, Education and Training, elearning, entrepreneurs, Learning, Learning for Work, Learning Programmes, Skills Training Programmes, Social Media by

 

 


http://www.squidoo.com/skills-and-learning-programme-development

OECD – Human Capital Learning for Life

Posted in Adult Learning, Education and Training, Skills Training Programmes, Workplace Learning by

From OECD Insights (image at link reference), valid and useful insights: 
http://www.oecd.org/document/56/0,3746,en_21571361_37705603_37781352_1_1_1_1,00.html

“Populations in many societies are ageing, meaning that in future there will be fewer people of working age to support growing numbers of retirees. The result is that more of us will need to go on working for longer. To do that societies will need to break down the barriers that prevent adults from updating their skills and education.

Chapter 5 of Learning for Life looks at adult learning, and finds out who’s getting it and who isn’t. It examines the barriers that prevent adults from developing their skills and knowledge. And it looks at what individuals, employers and governments can do to tear down those barriers.”

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3 Start-Up Announcements From the Education Innovation Summit

Posted in Adult Learning, Education, Education and Training, elearning, Learning, Learning Programmes, Skills Training Programmes by

Today I am sharing information about three new Education start-ups from an article by Nick DeSantis from The Chronicle of Higher Education: The first is a transfer college called Altius Education (a very much needed idea for South Africa, with our problematic achievements in Grade 12). The second is OpenStudy which has focused on soft skills, again an area requiring attention in South Africa. The third is about Sophia a social learning platform purchased by Capella Education System.

By Nick DeSantis

“The theme of disrupting higher education was buzzing among hundreds of conference attendees this week at the Education Innovation Summit at Arizona State University. The event offered start-up companies a captive audience for pitching their products. Here’s a small sample of announcements they made:

Altius Education: This company has already gained prominence among educators for its creation of a “transfer college,” which gives students a bridge to a bachelor’s degree by helping them transfer to traditional four-year institutions. And now the chief executive of Altius, Paul Freedman, has bigger plans—he wants to put “the flying car of higher education” in the driveway of every student. The engine, he says, is called Helix, a new tool that seeks to reinvent what learning-management software can do…

OpenStudy: Traditional grades are one-dimensional. Transcripts don’t convey how good students are at working with others and

Image representing OpenStudy as depicted in Cr...

Image via CrunchBase

solving problems. That’s the argument made by the leaders of OpenStudy, the social-learning network that calls itself a “global study group.” To fill in those gaps, the company has introduced SmartScore, a measurement of “soft skills” including teamwork, problem-solving, and engagement. In a blog post that previewed SmartScore’s introduction, OpenStudy’s co-founder, Preetha Ram, said the tool would ‘challenge the traditional notions of intelligence normally quantified by grades…’

Sophia: The social platform for teaching and learning was purchased this week by Capella Education Company, the parent of the for-profit Capella University. The partnership means Sophia will roll out low-cost college courses online, beginning with a college-algebra course in June…”

[Creative Commons licensed Flickr photo by tsutatsuta]

Reference: 
http://ht.ly/1iT2ic
 (Accessed 19/04/2012).

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World Youth Report puts Focus on Skills

Posted in Education and Training, Learning, Learning for Work, Skills Learning Programmes, Skills Training Programmes by

“Some of the views in the report point directly to the kinds of policy questions that are preoccupying governments – and employers – eager to match skilled jobs with skilled workers.

According to the young people cited in the report:

  • public and private employers need to collaborate more effectively with educational institutions;
  • vocational training needs to be made more available and accessible;
  • employers need to value vocational training, apprenticeships and non-formal training more highly;
  • labour market needs should be analysed continuously and extensively;
  • education and training programmes should be tailored to labour market needs.”

The above links closely to the New South African Post-Secondary Education Green Paper. However, in my view not all education programmes should be tailored to labour market needs – we should avoid commodification and flattening of all Higher Education to a labour market technicist paradigm.


http://efareport.wordpress.com/2012/02/10/world-youth-report-puts-focus-on-skills/
 (accessed 21/03/2012)

What do you think?

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Education for all Global Monitoring Report

Posted in Education, Education and Training, Learning, Learning for Work, Skills Training Programmes by

Follow this link for many interesting reports, for example:

Gender | Rural Women: While great progress has been made towards gender equality in education, many challenges remain. Did you know that nearly 2/3 of the world’s illiterate adults are women? The situation is particularly bad for rural women. Read more on our blog: 
http://bit.ly/GMRIWD


http://efareport.wordpress.com/2012/03/05/rural-women-miss-out-on-education-and-decent-jobs/
 (accessed 21/03/2012)

Skills Levies in a Climate of Skills Crisis

Posted in Skills Learning Programmes, Skills Training Programmes, Uncategorized, Workplace Learning by

Employers who pay PAYE are obliged by National Legislation to contribute 1% of their wage bill to the Skills Levy Fund. The Mandatory Claims provision of this fund enables employers to claim back 70% of this amount on educating/training current employees. Since most employers are not claiming this amount the funds become available for payment under the Discretionary Grant provision. This means that the Discretionary Funds become available to competitors who are investing in the knowledge and skills development of employees. Those companies who are not training are weakening in a very competitive market, especially in these very difficult economic times.

If Skills Development Facilitators submit Workplace Skills Plans that include accredited courses from accredited providers, companies can properly reclaim on their skills levies paid, and position themselves for a strong competitive advantage when the economy “turns”.  If training budgets have been cut, then this is the time to make full use of the Skills Development Fund. This is the magic moment, as the economy “turns”, to begin to train staff and secure a strong position for your company, ensuring improved employee relationships and staff who are able to align their personal goals with that of the company, whilst meeting equity and skills training targets. In the words of Dr Nzimande, workplaces need to become “training spaces”. The time is now.

Implementing Reflective Practice

Posted in Education, Education and Training, Learning, Learning for Work, Skills Training Programmes, Workplace Learning by
English: Steph's Kol Model

Image via Wikipedia

“There are a variety of strategies to implement reflective practice. On a simple level, we could think about reflection in the past, present, and future tense. The image to the right is from Kolb and accessed from Wikipedia. Donald Schön refers to  ‘reflection-in-action’ as analysis in the present tense…during the performance of a task.  Killion and Todnem (1991) categorize reflection in three directions:

1. Reflection-on-action

2. Reflection-in-action

3. Reflection-for-action.”

Killion, J., & Todnem, G. (1991). A process for personal theory building. Educational Leadership, 48(7), 14-16.

To read more visit the following site: Reflective Practice:
http://sites.google.com/site/reflection4learning/reflective-practice
 (Accessed 14/03/2012).

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Enquiry and Project-Based Learning

Posted in Education, Education and Training, Learning, Skills Training Programmes, Training Materials, Uncategorized by

A link to useful tools for enquiry and project-based learning:


http://education.alberta.ca/admin/aisi/themes/inquiry.aspx

Image from Alberta Education website (accessed 14/03/2012)

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