Adult Numeracy Level 2: Fill & Download for Free

Well, first we’d have to define what reading levels actually are. The OECD has done that donkey work for us, ta very much OECD, and here’s what they have to say about it:Below Level 1: Adults can read brief texts on familiar topics and locate a single piece of specific information. Only basic vocabulary knowledge is required and the adult is not required to understand the structure of sentences or paragraphs.Level 1: Adults can read relatively short digital or print texts to locate a single piece of information that is identical to or synonymous with the information given in the question. Knowledge and skill in recognising basic vocabulary, determining the meaning of sentences, and reading short paragraphs of text is expected.Level 2: Adults can make matches between the text, either digital or printed, and information. Adults can paraphrase or make low-level inferences.Level 3: Adults are required to read and navigate dense, lengthy or complex texts.Level 4: Adults can integrate, interpret or synthesise information from complex or lengthy texts. Adults can identify and understand one or more specific, non-central idea(s) in the text in order to interpret or evaluate subtle evidence-claim or persuasive discourse relationships.Level 5: Adults can search for, and integrate, information across multiple, dense texts; construct syntheses of similar and contrasting ideas or points of view; or evaluate evidence based arguments. Adults understand subtle, rhetorical cues and can make high-level inferences or use specialised background knowledge.In the UK there exists a body called the National Literary Trust. It looked at the OECD’s PIACC (which stands for Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies, and yes, I think they make these acronyms up first and then find something to fit, too) and announced that English adults have a rate of 16.4% below level 1. That’s about one in six. In Northern Ireland it’s slightly higher. It does numeracy and digital problem solving too (whatever that is) but we couldn’t care less about that and we’re only looking at literacy here. Most of the European countries are either slightly above or slightly below us in the raw scores, and the US is a bit behind us, hahaha! but not that much and so can we wipe those smug grins off our faces please, British people, thank you, especially because the Australians are in the top five and so are the Dutch. Yeah, not so funny now, is it, pull your socks up please.There’s six categories there and you’d think that the one in six spread would be even, wouldn’t you? It isn’t though. Only a few go past level 3, and the mode would be somewhere round level 2/3.Now, I spend all day sorting out technical stuff for people. I could be talking to a Doctor of Philosophy from Oxford at eleven and somebody who can’t string an articulate sentence together at ten-past. I get a lot of level 2 people who can’t understand what they’ve read. I get a bit less level 3 but it isn’t uncommon. I don’t get much level 4 and level 5 are like dinosaur bones. I see it a lot in daily life too. I’m not going to tell you where I am on this literacy scale because it’ll just make me sound like a braggart, but it’s safe to say I can tell the difference between the levels and label somebody with 95% accuracy in their first five sentences of the spoken word (since the level of spoken word and literacy levels are usually closely intertwined). This would back up the hypothesis that the mode hovers somewhere round the top end of level 2 and bottom of level 3.And this leads us to a problem. Because if, at eighteen years old, you are struggling to get past level 3, you might get good enough A level grades to get to a University, though most probably not a Russell Group, to study humanities (and for that matter, sciences, if you’re highly numerate but you struggle to express your ideas in words you’re going to struggle through your course too) and either crash out spectacularly after two years or come out with a formulaic degree which may well reflect your capacity for rote learning and the fact that by dint of labour you’ve managed to get to level 4 milieus. I’ve seen this regularly; supposedly highly educated people have been given rock-hard reads to look at and missed the entire point by miles because they haven’t the reading skills to properly evaluate the nuances in the text. Some texts are so oblique that it’s next door to impossible for even anybody at the bottom end of level 5 to grasp them; and some have nuggets in them that you have to do very deep mining indeed to extract.The short answer is that most people in rich western countries will find themselves at levels 2 or 3. It looks as though the same would be true in Eastern countries; but remember they can use different alphabets and even different writing systems.Reading isn’t difficult. It’s just processing a load of squiggles with your eyeballs. I don’t know anybody who can’t read Roman alphabets at all. The trick is in comprehending what you have read. Most people over-estimate their abilities in this field; paradoxically level 5s reading a difficult text tend to under-estimate their abilities and go back for a second, third and sometimes seventh look just to make sure. Then they might ask for a second opinion as well.

How does the learning of mathematics equip a child live effectively in the modern age of science and technology and enable him/her to contribute to the social and economic development of a country?For one of my sons, learning mathematics and science, has enabled him to work as the technical director of an IT company which produces software involved in running many of the world’s businesses and global transport systems.My daughter’s mathematical skills allow her to work as a lawyer dealing with business accounts and business transactions.Without mathematical skills citizens cannot competently manage their household budgets, to pay for food, housing, transport, or supporting families.They will also have difficulty in constructing, fitting or preparing, anything which requires accurate measuring or calculations.Without the technical skills of manufacturers and their workforces, we would be without the modern technical devices which run our homes, our cooking facilities, our communications, our information services about timetables and weather, our transport systems, and our power supplies.Which countries have the best literacy and numeracy rates?Teenagers in the Republic of Korea have the highest levels of literacy and numeracy of all OECD countries.The OECD looked at data from the Survey of Adult Skills (2012) and analysed the literacy and numeracy levels of 16-19 year olds.Japan, the Netherlands and Finland also place highly with small percentages of young adults with low levels of literacy and numeracy.In comparison, England’s teenagers have the worst levels of literacy coming in last place with more than 1 in 5 having a low level of literacy. The country doesn’t fare much better in numeracy, coming second to last with more than a quarter of 16-19 year olds lacking basic numeracy skills.The United States is also low in the rankings, coming last on numeracy with almost 40% of 16-19 year olds below level 2. American teenagers have slightly better results in literacy with around 1 in 5 having low level skills.Like illiteracy, innumeracy is a severe handicap - to individuals, to families, to communities, and to countries!Incompetent political meddling in schools takes it’s toll on standards.

I’d love to say nothing, and that life will be fine. I got a U, twice. I then gave up for 30 years, and not having maths didn’t stop me doing anything in that time. I went to college and got my A-Levels. I went to university and got a degree. And I got my dream career (journalism). All without maths O Level (as GCSEs were called then).The whole thing came back to bite me eventually though. I couldn’t enrol on a post-graduate teaching course at the age of 47 without the equivalent of GCSE maths. I was advised to sit a level 2 City & Guilds in adult numeracy. It’s not really a maths qualification to my mind, more the application of basic arithmetic to various problems.I mention the City & Guilds course because although I don’t think that particular qualification exists any more (if it does, take it!), you might want to consider doing the Level 2 C&G Functional Skills maths course at college or 6th Form instead of resitting your GCSE.C&G L2 FS maths is technically equal to GCSE maths. UCAS (the university admissions body) says: “Level 2 is at the same level of the RQF as GCSE grade C or above (existing GCSE qualifications) or Level 4 or above (reformed GCSE qualifications). Whilst the level of the qualification is the same as that of a GCSE, the breadth of content is narrower.”Functional SkillsAnd Bill Watkin, chief executive of the Sixth Form Colleges Association, says: “When only one per cent of E-grade students pass their maths GCSE on resit, why are they not sitting functional skills instead?” He describes the C&G alternative as a “win-win scenario”.He adds: “Every 16-year-old who has not achieved a C-grade or higher in their GCSE maths or English by the end of Year 11 must now continue in Year 12 to work towards passing a level two qualification (GCSE or equivalent), if they are to meet the DfE’s condition for funding.“Those who achieved a D-grade at 16 have no choice: it is the GCSE that they must resit. But those who achieved anything between E and U can either resit the GCSE, or study an alternative: the functional skills courses.“GCSEs vs functional skills: which resits should your students take?You are entitled to free resits at college anyway (alongside whatever other subject or subjects you want to do, eg A Levels, BTECs), so you’ve got nothing to lose by having another go. Or several goes. If you really think the GCSE is beyond you (it was beyond me, and probably still is) don’t get pushed into GCSE: insist on doing the C&G instead.By the way, I passed my C&G Level 2 in adult numeracy, and then my level 7 teaching qualification. I’m now a university lecturer: all without GCSE maths!So take heart. I’m sure you’ll do fine. But if you don’t, it’ll all work out in the end.