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Listening to Learners: Consultation with Learners about Adult Literacy Education in Scotland

1 Introduction

The Scotland Literacy 2000 Team commissioned this independent report on learners' perspectives on adult literacy education. The Team is providing a focus for development of national policy and strategy on adult literacy and numeracy, with the expectation that these will form a more significant area of educational policy and provision in Scotland in the future. The Team has consulted with organisations in Scotland on need and provision, action required, and targets and performance indicators. Additional learner consultation was desirable so that the perspectives of learners and potential learners on the future shape of adult literacy education can be made clear and public.

The Learning from Experience Trust co-ordinated the research, working with WEA Scotland. Focus group discussions were convened with learners and potential learners in five Scottish regions. In all, 31¹ focus groups were held in January and February 2001, facilitated by experienced adult educators from the WEA, who were trained in focus group research methods.

A total of 193 adults took part in the focus groups, 84 of them literacy and numeracy learners, 80 learners in other adult education programmes, and 29 not participating in any adult education. The focus groups were in five Scottish regions - Lothian, Glasgow area, Fife, Aberdeen area and Highlands.

Each focus group brought together a small group of adult learners or potential learners (ranging from 3 to 11 participants) for about a one-and-a-half-hour discussion. Common guidelines were used for all the focus groups, tailored to the three different broad groups of participants: learners in adult literacy or numeracy programmes, learners in other adult education, and non-participants in adult learning. Participants were assured of confidentiality and anonymity - in the report we give broad descriptions of region and type of learner, but no details that would identify individuals, organisations or institutions.

Providers of adult literacy and numeracy programmes in Scotland now use several different terms for their programmes, the most common being 'Essential Skills' (ES) or 'Adult Basic Education' (ABE). We note that many providers have rejected the term 'ABE' due to the negative connotations of the word 'basic'. The term 'Essential Skills' however, can be confused with the broader 'core skills' developments in the Scottish education system. This report adopts adult literacy and numeracy (ALN) as a single term to describe programmes aimed at developing adults' skills in one or both of these areas of adult learning.

Two focus groups included learners for whom English was not their first or only language. We held discussions with one ESOL (English for Speakers of Other Languages) class in the Lothian region and one Highlands ALN group included both native English speakers and ESOL learners. ESOL participants are included with other ALN learners in the focus group analysis, but are noted separately where appropriate.

For the most part in this report, literacy learners are simply designed as ALN learners. However, the focus groups included learners in ALN programmes in several different institutional settings. The largest number of ALN participants were in programmes run by Local Authorities, usually in community settings, and by voluntary organisations (a total of 53 participants). These are designated in the text as ALN learners. Other adult literacy and numeracy learners were in courses run by Further Education colleges or training providers, either in college or community settings (a total of 31 participants). These are designated in the text as ALN/FE learners.

Most 'Other Adult Learners' were in Return to Learn and similar programmes that enable people return to education; some were in FE vocational programmes or New Deal; and one was a creative writing class in a community mental health project.

Most non-participants were in other kinds of groups - a women's group, family centre, Homestart and a community group.

The focus group discussions were tape recorded and transcribed, then checked by the facilitator. Coding was carried out using NU*DIST software by Teresa Cairns and Anne Bellis, experienced qualitative researchers. The analysis and report were developed by Dr Juliet Merrifield of the Learning from Experience Trust.

Qualitative research like this is most useful to explore people's accounts of their experiences and ideas, and to try to understand them in context. The analysis in this report looks at both commonalties and differences. There are, for example, some striking commonalties in use of language among the learners we talked with - 'fitting in', 'confidence', 'own pace', and 'feeling stupid'.

There are also some deep differences among and between the groups of learners in their experiences, goals and ambitions, and their sense of their own abilities. The analysis of difference is limited by the small numbers of cases within some categories (e.g. comparing ALN learners in Local Authority run programmes with those in Further Education college programmes has to be tentative²). This research offers a broad overview, and it is hoped that future consultation will explore specific questions in more depth.

Summary of focus group participants

¹ 32 focus groups were held, but recording equipment failure in one means that the analysis is based on 31 sessions.
² Because of the small number of cases, the different institutional settings among ALN learners are noted in the analysis only where there were striking differences in their views or experiences.

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