ACL Forum

Joint WBL/ACL Forum, the Derbyshire Network, Ripley 14th May 2010

Last Friday the latest ACL/WBL Forum was held at the Derbyshire Network in Ripley and attracted 17 delegates to what was due to be an opportunity to get the latest update on Functional Skills.

Unfortunately Howard Parker, the Regional Co-ordinator for Functional Skills, was unable to attend due to family illness so we had an eleventh hour re-jig of the programme.

Disappointing as it was to not receive the update it did mean that we had more time for delegates to use the forum in it’s true context to share experiences and each delegate provided a short profile on themselves, their organisations and their experience, or not, of e-learning. This proved to be extremely useful and informative and demonstrated an impressive range of activity amongst providers in the region, some of whom were clearly well advanced with their development whilst others were just starting out. The important thing was that it gave everyone the chance to find out about everyone else and about the potential support available. Well done to all concerned.

Eileen Kirk, currently undertaking a secondment with the Regional Support Centre from her employment with the Derbyshire Adult & Community Education Service, gave a short presentation on the use of a Virtual Learning Environment, using DACES own recently developed Moodle to demonstrate the sort of thing that could be achieved. Several of the organisations present were either actively working to develop their own platforms or were very interested in exploring the possibilities. Any questions on the subject to Eileen                     eileen.kirk@rsc-em.ac.uk

We then had an update on developments in the sector, in particular news of the latest funding available from the LSIS Flexibility & Innovation Fund, and a reminder about the new LSIS Accounts available to all LSC/SFA funded providers.

Finally there was an opportunity to have a look at some of the technology currently popular with providers in the sector.

The Polaroid Pogo is an inkless wireless instant printer which produces business card size prints straight from your mobile phone using Bluetooth. Alternatively it can be connected to a digital camera. The printer is compact, easy to carry and ideal for recording and saving images. The photos are also self adhesive so ideal for including in a portfolio. And best of all the printer is only around £20.

The Prime Pulse Smartpen is  a pen that records both handwriting and voice. It is relatively unobtrusive in use and it uploads data to your computer. It has the added ability to link the spoken word to written notes using special notepaper, synchronizing the two for easy reference later. Notes can be converted to Word documents with appropriate software.

The notepads are around £5 for A4 size and the 4gb pen with charger, headphones and case is around £160

Creative Vado one touch camcorders are proving to be a popular and inexpensive way to record evidence at around £50. Capable of about 60 minutes of good quality video and audio, very easy to use and upload.

For full details of the Forum held on 14th May at the Derbyshire Network, Ripley see under WBL Forum

Last Friday we held the latest joint ACL/WBL Forum at the City Learning Centre in Leicester. The venue was good but there were some problems with parking as it had been decided to re-tarmac the centre car park on Friday morning! Delegates did manage to find alternative parking within the school complex but not the best start to the day.

Attendance at this forum was very disappointing with only eight delegates..............

We started the event with a series of News Snippets from Phil Hardcastle - RSC Advisor. He covered additional e-guides training events, an opportunity for providers to comment on the Future of Informal Adult Learning, Family Learning - a model for the 21st century, free resources for adults with learning difficulties and information about the latest series of books available through the Quick Reads initiative.

We then had a very informative and involving session from Andrew Edis ILT Co-ordinator at New College Nottingham who very kindly stepped in to replace the planned Video in WBL session by Phil Brown who was unable to make the forum. Andrew introduced us to the technology used in the toolkits developed for use by WBL assessors at New College and then got everyone involved in using the kit - just to see how easy it was to gather and store evidence using video, audio and photographic evidence as well as a portable scanner and a digital notepad.

Next we had a mini workshop, presented by Vic Dejean of LSIS, on Using Technology for Professional and Organisational Development through the Leadership Toolkits currently available FREE to providers. I know some of you had looked at these previously but had been put off by the £500 cost so now you can benefit from what is an excellent resource without any outlay.

If demand exists it might be possible to arrange for a full toolkit session to be held in the region. If you would be interested in attending such an event please let me know.

Finally we had a short presentation from Kevin Martin who has recently been appointed Work Based Learning Support Manager at the East Midlands Centre of Excellence for Teacher Training. Kevin is able to provide support on a range of matters.

On 26th November we will be running a Becta Generator training session at the City Learning Centre, Beaumont Leys, Leicester. This is a full day event and is free to providers.

The next forum will be taking place on Friday 12th February 2010 venue to be confirmed. Get the date in your diary now!

Joint ACL/WBL Forum, Idle Valley Rural Centre - 22nd May 2009

The latest WBL Forum was held again as a joint event with ACL providers. The venue was the Idle Valley Rural Centre in Retford, a new addition to North Notts College. In spite of a couple of delegates having a bit of difficulty locating the Centre we only suffered a slight delay in getting underway. It was good to see a number of new faces as well as regular attenders and in total there were 17 delegates representing 15 organisations.

We started with an online presentation by Maureen Fraser of  Derbyshire Adult and Community Education Service on the use of Moodle as a learning platform. Maureen has developed the DACES Moodle site and has also worked with a Manchester based WBL provider in the tourist industry. As well as providing an opportunity to see what can be done with Moodle we were also able to experience an online presentation using Elluminate.

Next we had a session led by Ian Richards of Lincolnshire County Council Teenage Services who gave an interesting overview of how their very successful, Entry to Employment programme is and the extent to which technology and e-learning have contributed. The most significant aspect being the drive to increase understanding and familiarity of staff with the various technologies and the role played by learners using  their existing  knowledge to help in developing staff.

The morning finished with a open forum session with feedback from the recent ALP Conference on Ofsted Inspections, The National Apprenticeship Service and the Foundation Learning Tier  and questions and comments from the floor.

·         an interesting observation was made about how learners with a hearing difficulty would find online sessions difficult to follow as the video was out of synch with the audio. Much easier to follow without the video.

·         a suggestion was made that future forums could perhaps include more opportunity for providers to seek help with particular issues from other  providers  - a good idea and really what the forum should be all about.

 The forum also provided lots of opportunity for networking.

Joint ACL/WBL Forum Grantham Earlesfield Youth Centre, 20th February 2009

On Friday of last week we held the latest Forum - this one was a joint event to reflect the many similarities between WBL and ACL. The Forum was hosted by Lincolnshire Teenage Services at their Youth Centre in Grantham. Our thanks to Ian and staff for looking after us so well.

For further details of the forum content with links to presentations use the link here:

Joint Forum Content

Useful documents

ACL Case studies on the Excellence Gateway website

If you go to http://www.excellencegateway.org.uk/page.aspx?o=case-studies-all and choose Adult and Community Learning you can view all the case studies from the sector.

Here are a few examples from within our region: