A good programme-level strategy should feel broad in scope. It should be broad enough that you can apply the strategy to your programme over time. But it should also set some more specific direction in terms of what kinds of skills you’re hoping to develop.
We think there should be three parts to your strategy. Here’s what you should do in the three parts:
1. Identify the literacy skill area that you want to concentrate on
Make it practical, but it should be in broad terms. Use the strands of the Learning Progressions for Adult Literacy that you already identified as important in the last assessment. E.g.
- Teach my learners how to read with understanding.
2. Say what the literacy focus is going to be within the skill area.
You can start to narrow things down. Include one or two specific literacy skills or progressions that you want to develop or practice.
Use the progressions that you identified as important from the last assessment. Choose at least one that you know is critical. Add this to your statement. E.g.
- Teach my learners how to Read with Understanding with a focus on technical vocabulary.
You can choose more than one progression if you want. Sometimes it makes sense to deal with two related literacy skills or progressions at the same time. Add both to your statement if it makes sense. E.g.
- Teach my learners how to read with understanding with a focus on technical vocabulary and how to read critically.
Here’s another example with a combined focus on two skills.
- Teach my learners to write to communicate with a focus on how to use spelling strategies and academic vocabulary.
3. Say what your broad teaching context is
Your broader teaching context might be a formal qualification or programme module that you deliver. Or it could be more informal, like an ESOL workplace literacy course or work readiness programme. You would have already identified this as your context in the last assessment.
It’s important to add this onto your statement because it limits the strategy to your work. Here’s the whole strategy. E.g.
- Teach my learners how to read with understanding with a focus on technical vocabulary and reading critically in the context of health and safety training for new steel fabrication students.”
- Teach my learners to write to communicate with a focus on how to use spelling strategies and academic vocabulary in the context of a police and armed forces recruitment and preparation course.