View comments from Mark Frickleton, CEO at Building Service Contractors - ITO, taken at the Symposium in Hamilton, July 2011.
Transcript
We have a very good literacy writer, and now we're writing a whole set of resource materials for the industry with a literacy and numeracy content added into them. And so we're starting... we've looked at our old stuff and just discarded it basically, and have started from scratch, and what they're getting is new. And had some startling feedback.
It is definitely making a difference, yes. Some of the anecdotal stuff that's coming back from the trainers and assessors certainly shows that it is staring to have an impact.
And we will be continuing down the embedding path. We're writing another seven to ten more workbooks this year for various... for some more unit standards within the industry. So yeah, we will continue down that. And it just becomes, as of next year it will be business as usual. Everything we write will have some sort of embedded component in it, be it literacy or numeracy.
And I must say this: we are not dumbing down the information that we previously used in our other workbooks. It's the same information – we are presenting it differently.
Rather than them just standing there lecturing – because that's what we used to do – is that because the workbooks are probably more interactive, rather than everybody just sitting there listening they can actually take more part. So the trainer now becomes more of a faciltator at times, and this sort of thing. So yes, they are starting to realise that, "Oh, I just don't have to stand there and teach – I can actually get these guys and they can help, and we can help each other. And it becomes more of, sort of, the trainees, which are the cleaners, helping each other as well as participating more in the class. So yeah, it is changing.