5 Core Skills

5 Levels of Performance

3 Domains of Communication

How the ACSF Works

Australian Core Skills Framework

978-1-921916-49-6

Project Team:

Philippa McLean Consulting (lead agent):

Philippa McLean Kulu Adventures in Management:

Kate Perkins Australian Council for Educational Research:

Dave Tout, Linda Wyse & Associates:

Kath Brewer, Linda Wyse

Expert comments provided by:

Jenni Oldfield, Precision Consultancy, Louise Wignall, Wignall Consulting, Chris Tully, Kangan Batman Institute of TAFE

Thank you to all those practitioners who helped in the development of this document by providing expertise, time, feedback and suggestions.

© Commonwealth of Australia 2012

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This document can also be accessed via website at: www.deewr.gov.au/acsf

Minister's Foreword

I am pleased to provide this foreword for the revised Australian Core Skills Framework (ACSF). The framework is a tool that describes and measures language, literacy and numeracy skills in the numerous contexts in which individuals work, learn and communicate. The ACSF underpins the quality management of Australian Government language, literacy and numeracy programs and is a key component of the infrastructure which exists to support and improve adult learning.

The challenge that confronts Australia today is how we manage our future economic growth to ensure that we all benefit. The Government is committed to providing opportunities for all Australians so they can share in the success of the economy and participate in society. We recognise the need for Australians to be educated and skilled and that is why we have invested heavily in our workforce.

In the May 2011 Federal Budget, the Government provided an extra $183 million over four years for foundation skills programs, including adult literacy initiatives as part of the Building Australia’s Future Workforce package. This major investment brings the total Australian Government commitment in this area to more than $760 million over four years.

We have also championed a national approach to improving literacy and numeracy in the early childhood and schools sectors. We will continue to work with the states and territories to implement the National Foundation Skills Strategy for Adults, which was endorsed by the Standing Council on Tertiary Education Skills and Employment on 25 November 2011.

It was always intended that the first version of the ACSF released in 2008 would be reviewed after a couple of years in operation. This revised ACSF has been extensively user-tested by practitioners familiar with the original document. For the first time the ACSF includes a Pre Level 1 Supplement and a set of descriptors for performance below level 1 in all five core skills. This revision of the ACSF is a timely enhancement and I would like to thank everyone who has contributed to its revision.

Senator Chris Evans

How the ACSF Works

Table of Contents

Appendices

Appendix 1: Performance Features Grids 150Appendix 2: Pre Level 1 Supplement 180Appendix 3: Glossary 190Appendix 4: Bibliography 192Appendix 5: Acknowledgements 196

Tables

Table 1: ACSF Performance Variables Grid 7Table 2: Text types 9Table 3: ACSF Performance Indicators 10Table 4: Dylan's ACSF ratings 15

Diagrams

Diagram 1: ACSF overview 11Diagram 2: Learning overview 22Diagram 3: Reading overview 49Diagram 4: Writing overview 74Diagram 5: Oral Communication overview 100Diagram 6: Numeracy overview 127Diagram 7: ACSF Pre Level 1 Overview 180

Figures

Figure 1: Stav: Core skills profile 13Figure 2: Amil: Core skills profile 14Figure 3: Amil: Numeracy skills profile 14Figure 4: Deng: Core skills profile 182 Figure 5: Wilma: Core skills profile 183

Introduction

What is the ACSF? 2How can the ACSF be used? 2Background to the ACSF 3Theoretical underpinnings 4Key features of the ACSF 5Describing performance 10Overview of the ACSF 11The ACSF in action 12The ACSF and the AQF 16

The Core Skills

Learning 20

Level 1 24Level 2 28Level 3 32Level 4 36Level 5 40

Reading 46

Level 1 50Level 2 54Level 3 58Level 4 62Level 5 66

Writing 72

Level 1 76Level 2 80Level 3 84Level 4 88Level 5 92

Oral Communication 98

Level 1 102Level 2 106Level 3 110Level 4 114Level 5 118

Numeracy 124

Level 1 128Level 2 132Level 3 136Level 4 140Level 5 144

Introduction

Introduction

What is the ACSF?

How can the ACSF be used?

The Australian Core Skills Framework (ACSF) provides a rich, detailed picture of real life performance in the five core skills of:

– Learning

– Reading

– Writing

– Oral Communication

– Numeracy.

These skills are essential for individuals to participate effectively in our society. They are inextricably interwoven into all parts of our lives, being directly or indirectly linked to the physical, social and economic wellbeing of individuals, workplace productivity and safety, community interaction and capacity, and ultimately to Australia’s economic and community wellbeing. The ACSF reflects contemporary use of English in Australia.

The ACSF has been developed to facilitate a consistent national approach to the identification and development of the core skills in diverse personal, community, work, and education and training contexts. It offers:

– shared concepts and language for identifying, describing and discussing core skills

– a systematic approach to benchmarking, monitoring and reporting on core skills performance.

Adult core skills development is lifelong because we are likely to require new or enhanced core skills each time we take on new roles and responsibilities or move into a new situation, or as a result of changes in the environment, including new technologies. Thus, any focus on improving core skills should not be confined to those with limited skills, but extend ‘to all people trying to understand new forms of communication and information as they take on different roles in life and work’ (Foster & Beddie 2005 p.1).

To capture this, the ACSF describes performance in each of the core skills at five levels of performance along a continuum. It also acknowledges that the level of performance is not static either within or across core skills, but is influenced by the interplay of a range of variables, including the context within which the skills are applied. The inclusion of Learning as a core skill also reflects the dynamics of the ACSF and the critical importance of adopting strategies that help us adapt to changing circumstances and new challenges throughout our lives.

Benchmarking an individual’s core skills performance

The ACSF can be used to identify and describe an individual’s performance in any of the core skills at a point in time. The Framework’s specificity makes it possible to identify a person’s areas of strength and need with some precision, so that training can be targeted to areas of need and an individual’s progress monitored over time. The ACSF can also be used to develop core skills profiles of learner cohorts.

Mapping core skills requirements in education and training

The ACSF can be used to map the core skills requirements of any education and training course or unit in order to clarify and articulate core skills expectations, priorities and gaps. This facilitates the identification of similarities and differences between core skills requirements and expectations of performance within and across courses, disciplines and sectors.

A broad range of adult English language, literacy and numeracy (LLN) curricula have been mapped to the ACSF and it is also being used to identify, clarify and describe core skills requirements in national Training Package qualifications.

Tailoring approaches to teaching and learning

Following mapping of course requirements and materials, and identification of learner strengths and weaknesses, the ACSF can be used to:

– tailor curriculum, materials and methodologies to learner needs

– design and rate core skills assessment instruments

– evaluate the potential usefulness of assessment tasks by identifying the ACSF levels and Performance Features being assessed

– develop self evaluation tools which increase learner engagement and ownership

– assist teachers/trainers to provide specific feedback on performance.

Describing core skills relevant to the workplace and employment

The ACSF enables LLN practitioners to identify and discuss core skills issues with others in the workplace. This information helps human resources managers and workplace trainers, for example, when designing communication strategies and developing training for employees at any level of an organisation. It can also be used by specialist LLN practitioners to identify the core skill requirements of a job in order to provide appropriate support and training for someone moving into a new position.

The ACSF provides a framework that enables consistent descriptions of the five core skills in training programs tailored to workplace performance. Training Package developers can use the ACSF to ensure that the core skills associated with competency standards are articulated clearly and adequately addressed as part of unit design and descriptions. This in turn makes it easier for teachers/trainers to address core skills development as an integral part of training.

Informing decisions regarding funding and referrals

Where government funding is provided for core skills training, LLN practitioners may use the ACSF levels of performance to support applications to government agencies, report on learner progress and evaluate program effectiveness. The use of the ACSF for these purposes facilitates national equity and accountability, and provides valid statistical feedback on the impact of government-funded programs that focus on core skills development.

Introduction

Background to the ACSF

The ACSF has been broadly based on the National Reporting System (NRS), a mechanism for reporting outcomes of adult English LLN provision (Coates et al, 1995). However, while the NRS was primarily designed as a reporting tool, the ACSF has been designed as a generic framework with applications in a wider range of contexts.

A draft version of the ACSF was published in December 2008 and trialled with many different learners in diverse contexts, including community and workplace based training, senior secondary, vocational education and training, and higher education. Both the draft and final versions of the ACSF have been informed by:

– a broad range of theoretical understandings

– an analysis of current accredited curriculum documents and relevant frameworks, including the Scottish Qualifications Authority Guide to assessing workplace core skills (SQA 2000); the Australian and New Zealand Information Literacy Framework: principles, standards and practice (Bundy ed. 2004); An Adult Literacy and Numeracy Curriculum Framework (Communities Scotland 2005); the Australian Qualifications Framework (Australian Qualifications Framework Advisory Board to MCEETYA 2007); the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages: Learning, Teaching and Assessment (Council of Europe 2001); the New Zealand Learning Progressions for Adult Literacy (Tertiary Education Commission 2008); and the Australian National Curriculum (Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority 2011)

– ongoing input and advice from key stakeholders, including experienced adult LLN practitioners from across Australia

– the knowledge and experience of the project team, who have drawn on their national and international experience in the fields of assessment, verification, curriculum and professional development.

Introduction

Theoretical underpinnings

In keeping with contemporary theory and practice and in order to provide the richest possible picture of performance, the ACSF is structured to reflect, as closely as possible, real life performance of the core skills across three domains – personal and community, workplace and employment, and education and training.

Key theoretical underpinnings and approaches behind the ACSF include:

– a socio-linguistic and socio-constructivist view of core skills as complex social practices embedded in context, and influenced by purpose, audience and contextualised expectations and conventions (see Ivanic et al 2006, Lonsdale & McCurry 2004, McKenna & Fitzpatrick 2005, Skillen et al 1998, Tout & Johnston 1995)

– theories of adult learning, including a recognition that core skills are best learned within a context that the adult learner perceives to be relevant and important (see Brookfield 1995, Burns 1995, Casey et al 2006, Knowles 1980, Mackeracher 1996, Rogers 1996)

– a view of learning, reading, writing, speaking, listening and numeracy as interactive, constructive processes of meaning-making in which individuals can be seen to assume four roles – code breaker, text participant, text user and text analyst (see Luke & Freebody 1990, Johnston 1994)

– the components of task and text complexity and the variables that interact to determine the level of difficulty of information-processing tasks, including for mathematical tasks (see Kirsch & Mosenthal 1990, Kirsch 2001, Gal et al 2009)

– a progression style approach to core skills development as a person expands their understanding of, and control over, the processes involved, including an increasing awareness of an author or speaker’s purpose and intended audiences, and of an individual’s own purposes (see OECD 2002)

– a view that texts serve particular functions in a social context and that different texts have predictable language structures depending on their function

– a recognition of the key role played by digital technology in the creation of many kinds of texts, and in facilitating access to, and navigation of, texts

– a view that investment in human capital, economic and workforce outcomes through education and training opportunities directly support, and impact positively on, social capital outcomes for individuals and various target groups participating in core skills training and courses across Australia (see Barton 2002, Coulombe et al 2004, Hartley & Horne 2006).

Guiding Principles

The design of the ACSF was informed by the following:

– the core skills can be seen as discrete skills; however, their interrelationships are also critical

– the core skills are contextualised; each context in which individuals operate has its own core skills requirements, expectations and rules which need to be learned

– an individual’s performance at any time will be influenced by the interplay of a number of variables described under Four performance variables.

Introduction

Key Features of the ACSF

The ACSF describes each of the five core skills across three interactive dimensions:

– Five levels of performance ranging from 1 (low level performance) to 5 (high level performance)

– Four performance variables that may influence a person’s performance at any time:

• support

• context

• text complexity

• task complexity.

– Three Domains of Communication, broad contexts within which the core skill may be used:

• personal and community

• workplace and employment

• education and training.

The following pages provide more detail on the structure and key components of the ACSF.

Five levels of performance

Each level in each core skill is described in detail to enable consistent decisions to be made about an individual’s performance at any point in time. The five levels of performance represent milestones along a continuum of performance.

The levels of performance are described using:

– Indicators

– Focus Areas

– Performance Features

– Sample Activities.

In determining performance, the relevant Indicators are interpreted using the Focus Areas and Performance Features, in conjunction with the performance variables.

Introduction

Four Performance Variables

A key feature of the ACSF is the recognition of four factors that may influence an individual’s performance at any point in time across any of the core skills.

When we learn something new, we usually benefit from some type of support. Support can take many forms and come from diverse sources, e.g. through a demonstration, advice from an expert, teacher/trainer or colleague, a technical manual or a help desk. As an individual develops the skills and confidence associated with being an independent learner, the nature and degree of the support required is likely to change. Those operating at the lower levels of the ACSF are likely to need a higher level of support throughout the learning process. However, an individual operating at a higher ACSF level may also need support when learning something new and challenging. The nature and duration of that assistance may be very different, reflecting the fact that higher level learners have the capacity to initiate and manage their own support processes.

When used for assessment purposes, the ACSF assumes that an individual at any level will be able to demonstrate performance within the support levels described and where the context, text complexity and task complexity are appropriate for the level. If further support is still required, this should be taken into account when benchmarking performance at that time.

An individual’s level in the ACSF is described as ‘exit level’; that is, a person is able to demonstrate what is required at that level. If a person is not able to demonstrate what is required at that level, they are rated as being at the lower level.

Drawing on the work of Halliday and Hasan (1976), the ACSF acknowledges that the prior knowledge or experience a person brings to a situation, including familiarity with text, task and topic, can make a significant difference to performance. This is reflected across the five ACSF levels of performance as an individual applies knowledge and skills with increasing confidence and competence within familiar contexts, and learns how to transfer and adapt existing skills to new contexts.

The components of task and text complexity are derived from the work of Kirsch and Mosenthal (1990) and Kirsch (2001), who argue that a number of variables interact to determine the level of difficulty of information-processing tasks. In their construct, task difficulty increases as:

– the length and complexity of the text increases

– the type of process required to respond to a question about a text increases in complexity, e.g. straight location of information compared with integration of several pieces of information

– the kind of information required to respond to a question about a text increases in complexity, e.g. concrete compared with abstract

– the lack of correspondence between the information in the text and in a question about that text increases

– the degree of inference the reader is required to make increases.

The performance variables of support, context, text and task complexity in the ACSF are illustrated in Table 1.

Given the impact of these variables on performance, they must be taken into account when evaluating the appropriate level of an assessment task, or in determining an individual’s level of performance. As a reminder of this, the appropriate descriptors are also incorporated into each level of each core skill in the main body of the ACSF.

1 The ACSF does not include performances features for decoding purely visual texts or languages such as film.

6 | ACSF

Introduction

Introduction

Three Domains of Communication

Drawing on the concept of ‘lifeworlds’ – the three realms of existence described by the New London Group (1996, p.71) as ‘our working lives, our public lives and our private lives’ – the ACSF considers three broad Domains of Communication when describing performance across the breadth of contexts with each core skill. As these are not entirely separable, they may be better understood as orientations rather than as clearly distinct and exclusive categories.

– the different ways personal history, knowledge, attributes, goals and opinions are drawn on and expressed for particular purposes

– learning about and interacting with public institutions and those in the local community

– engaging with issues of public interest

– applying mathematics for individual needs such as personal finances, for personal measurement, for interpreting public statistical data and information or for public or community requirement.

– relating to preparing for and seeking employment

– within an existing workplace, including organisational and management tasks

– relating to entering a new work environment or taking on a new role.

– learning towards a formal qualification at any level of the Australian Qualifications Framework (AQF) within any sector (senior secondary, vocational, higher education)

– learning within an LLN program such as the Language, Literacy and Numeracy Program (LLNP) and the Workplace English Language and Literacy (WELL) Program

– learning within a community based program

– formal or informal on-the-job learning and training.

In any Domain of Communication, various text types play a key role with the main forms being narrative, procedural, persuasive, informative, creative, technical, regulatory and descriptive. Each is characterised by particular structures, conventions and patterns.

Text types may be continuous or non-continuous:

– continuous texts are defined as those in which sentences are organised into paragraphs, pages, sections and chapters

– in non-continuous texts, information is organised in graphic or diagrammatic forms such as lists, tables, graphs, maps or forms (Kirsch 2001, p.13).

It is a feature of the contextualised nature of core skills that some text types are considered more appropriate than others in particular contexts, that the same text type may be used for different purposes in different fields and that features such as structure, layout and register may vary depending on purpose, audience and convention.

Table 2 provides examples of some text types likely to be found in each Domain of Communication.

Introduction