TSG includes the following:
Skills check
This quick test shows whether a learner or potential employee is competent at Level 2 of the relevant National Standards. It is an ideal first placement tool for those dealing with groups of individuals, and the screener’s customisable management tool collates results and produces instant reports that help assess learners’ skills needs. Colleges, employers and other establishments or organisations can identify quickly and efficiently basic skills needs across large groups of people.
The skills checks meet LSC requirements for the initial identification of basic skills needs, and can also be used at company interviews along with other relevant skills tests for the job.
Assessment
TSG comes with easy-to-use initial assessment tools for both literacy and numeracy, with separate practice tests for both. The software assesses learners in a non-threatening and age-appropriate way against the relevant core curricula to discover the level they are working at in each of the key areas of the curricula – a spiky profile. It then automatically generates a set of activities to form the basis of a personalised learning programme.
The assessment tools allow learners to take their assessments over a number of sittings, so they can stop at any time and continue where they left off later.
Learning
Target Skills Gold provides not only the full library of Target Skills literacy and numeracy resources at Entry 1 to Level 2, including the Target Skills for Work content; it also gives access to an extensive range of external online learning materials, including DfES, BBC Skillswise and NIACE resources.
The materials provide a wide range of skills-focused and contextualised learning materials to cover the knowledge and skills required at different levels of the adult core curricula. They are interactive and absorbing, and include built in checks and self-tests to increase motivation and to help the learner (and tutor) monitor progress.
Tutors have full control over their learners’ learning plans via the Tutor area – see below.
Practice
Target Skills Gold includes links to web-based practice tests, so that learners can prepare to sit the national tests. Results from these tests are stored in the learner’s learning record so that a tutor can see when a learner is ready to sit their national test.
Final test
Target Skills Gold prepares learners for the National Test in Literacy or Numeracy by providing learning, practice and advice. As with many parts of the Target Skills Gold system, on-screen text can be customised to instruct learners how to arrange to take the test in their particular institution.
Target Skills Gold can be configured so that a learner’s results from the National Test can be stored, providing the complete Skills for Life learning record for that learner.
Tutor area
Target Skills Gold comes with a sophisticated tutor site to help tutors manage their learners’ learning. This includes at-a-glance lists of learners highlighting which learners need attention, views of a learner’s learning plan and complete learning record, and the ability to edit and update a learner’s learning plan with new items. Tutors can also send messages to learners both individually and as a group.
Target Skills Gold can be configured to allow tutors to add learners, and tutors will soon also be able to upload their own learning materials so that they can be added to a learners learning plan.
Administrator area
Target Skills Gold comes with an administrator area to make it easy to maintain your Target Skills Gold site. Here an administrator can add groups, learners and tutors either individually or in bulk, and update profiles of individual learners and tutors as necessary
All initial assessment results and learner tracking are saved on your own area of the server and can be interrogated for reporting at any time. This makes record-keeping and applying for funding easy. Exporting the data to other systems such as Maytas or EBS for individual learning plan (ILP) submission is also straightforward.
The administrator area also allows you to configure your site to reflect your organisation. This includes the ability to set key terms such as tutor, teacher and lecturer.