Session Information
23 SES 09 C, Connecting Alternative Stories: Challenging Narratives about Adults’ and Young People’s Literacy Skills and Practices
Symposium
Contribution
This paper draws on a secondary analysis of PIAAC data – Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies. It brings together quantitative data about individual uses of skills and literacy levels to examine their interrelations within the German adult population. PIAAC results indicate that frequent use of reading and writing at work correlates with higher levels of literacy proficiency (Klaukien et al., 2013: 149f.). Based on this result, it seems appropriate to describe the relation between ‘skills’ and ‘uses’ as a two-way relationship; ‘practice reinforces proficiency, and proficiency facilitates practice” (OECD, 2013: 212). According to a ‘literacy as social practice’ approach, the quantitative analysis of adults’ literacy and numeracy practices could provide relevant policy information for adult basic education, but its potential is not fully used yet (Carpentieri, 2015; Reder, 2009). Therefore, this paper focuses on the identification of different subgroups of adults and the comparison of their literacy and numeracy practices to offer policy recommendations. The research question is: Within the German adult population, which subgroups can be identified and described with regards to their use of skill? In order to differentiate adults’ uses of skills, a Latent Class Analysis was carried out. LCA is a statistical procedure that assigns respondents into groups, characterized by different response patterns. For this purpose, a subset of ‘skill use’ variables was chosen. It includes the uses of literacy skills at work and in everyday life. Beside these literacy skills, the uses of numeracy and ICT-skills are also part of the model. As a result of this LCA procedure, three groups can be distinguished in terms of the frequency that they use selected skill-related activities. Surprisingly, the individual literacy level does not clearly predict the group membership. Two out of the three groups contain a significant number of adults with lower literacy skills. A further interesting result is that participants in one of the groups seem to compensate for the few chances they have to use their skills at work by using them more often in their everyday life. Both results contribute to draw a more differentiated picture of adults with lower literacy skills. The presentation points to some subgroups’ possible learning needs and interests. This will generate a discussion about potentially more adequate literacy programs addressing target groups in adult basic education.
References
Carpentieri, J. D. (2015). Adding New Numbers to the Literacy Narrative: Using PIAAC Data to Focus on Literacy Practices. In: Mary Hamilton, Bryan Maddox und Camilla Addey (Eds.). Literacy as numbers. Researching the politics and practices of international literacy assessment (pp. 93–110). Cambridge: University Press . Klaukien, A.; Ackermann, D.; Helmschrott, S.; Rammstedt, B.; Solga, H. and Wößmann, L. (2013). Grundlegende Kompetenzen auf dem Arbeitsmarkt. In: Beatrice Rammstedt (Ed.). Grundlegende Kompetenzen Erwachsener im internationalen Vergleich. Ergebnisse von PIAAC 2012 (pp. 127–166). Münster: Waxmann. OECD (2013). OECD Skills Outlook 2013: First Results from the Survey of Adult Skills. OECD Publishing. Retrieved from http://skills.oecd.org/OECD_Skills_Outlook_2013.pdf. Reder, St. (2009). Scaling Up and Moving In: Connecting Social Practices Views to Policies and Programs in Adult Education.Literacy and Numeracy Studies, 16 (2), 35–50.
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