 |
MATHEMATICS |
|
MATHEMATICS |
 |
NUMERACY SURVEYS SUPPORT THE NEED FOR A NEW NUMERACY CAMPAIGN |
Two surveys published on 16 January 1997 by the Basic Skills Agency as part of the launch of the BBC's Numeracy campaign, Count Me In, suggest that:
- poor numeracy skills have a serious effect on people, especially in employment;
- the numeracy skills of adults in the UK may not be as good as those of people in our competitor countries.
Undertaken by City University on behalf of the Basic Skills Agency, the study is based on a 10% sample [1714 adults] from the longitudinal National Child Development Study [NCDS].
NCDS has followed a sample of people born in a single week in 1958 through to adult life At age 37 their basic skills were tested using functional tasks which are commonly needed in everyday life
The tasks were at different levels of difficulty, from working out simple change in shopping to calculating a % service charge.
Just under a quarter of the 37 year old adults had very low numeracy skills, which would make it difficult to complete everyday tasks successfully.
Only 9% of those with poor numeracy recognised or acknowledged their difficulty, compared with 19% for literacy.
Findings
The results showed that poor numeracy skills do have an impact on adults' lives, and competent literacy skills do not compensate for this.
18% of men and 27% of women were in the first two groups - with poor numeracy.
Men with poor numeracy were more prone to unemployment, more likely to be in manual jobs, less likely to have had work related training and more likely to earn a low weekly wage.
The pattern was somewhat different for women, who were more likely to be in part time jobs. Numeracy still had an impact: only one in four with poor numeracy held a full time job, contrasted with over two fifths of those with competent numeracy.
Adults with poor basic skills [both literacy and numeracy] had, as children, disadvantaged home circumstances. Their school tests already predicted their later difficulties. Whilst those with poor literacy skills were often identified by teachers at 7 and 11, less than one fifth of those with poor numeracy skills as adults were identified as poor at maths by their teachers.
At age 33 poor literacy and poor numeracy were equally associated with having no qualifications, for women. For men numeracy was dominant:
30% of those with poor numeracy and competent literacy still had no qualifications. This compared with 7% of those with competent literacy and numeracy, 14% of those with competent numeracy and poor literacy and 50% of those with poor numeracy and poor literacy.
Commentary
The study deals with people born in 1958, and tested in 1995. The data on their schooling and employment experience needs to be seen in the context of its time.
Literacy skills often overshadow numeracy skills. What this study shows is that numeracy has a significant and sustained impact on adults' lives, especially their chances in the labour market.
The study shows the marked effect of poor numeracy on women's employment. Whilst the position in schools now suggests that girls' results are improving, women need increased opportunities to raise their skills.
The rapid decline of unskilled jobs underlines the importance of improving adults' numeracy skills.
Undertaken by Opinion Research Business [ORB] on behalf of the Basic Skills Agency, the survey involved testing people aged 16-60 with 12 numeracy tasks in 7 industrialised countries.
The countries involved were the UK, the Netherlands, France, Sweden, Japan, Australia and Denmark.
Just under 6,000 people were involved in the study. They were representative of the population of the countries involved.
In the UK the number of people who refused to try to tackle the task(s) at all was higher than in any of the other countries. This may have been, however, for a variety of reasons unconnected with their mathematical skill.
The Tasks
The Results
The most difficult questions were apparently questions 11 and 12 with only an average across all of the countries of 68% getting the correct answer.
While 43% of those included in the survey in Japan got all 12 of the tasks right, only 20% did so in the UK.
At the other end of the scale while more than a fifth of those in the UK [22%] could only answer up to 5 of the questions posed, only 4% of those in the Netherlands were as poor as this with numbers.
While overall we could only get an average of 7.9 correct answers out of twelve, all of the other countries managed to get 9 or more.
In the UK the C2DE group did worse than the ABC1 group.
In the UK women also performed worse than men and 16-24 year olds did worse than people from other age groups. 45-54 year olds did best.
Although the size of the survey makes it difficult to be certain, this seems to be the pattern in all of the other countries except Japan where there was little difference between age groups or men and women.
Commentary
It's important to emphasise that this was a relatively small scale study. However, it bears out the conclusion of the Government's Skills Audit published last year.
The people in this survey were educated some years ago and well before the National Curriculum and Key Stage Assessment were introduced.
The Chairman of the Basic Skills Agency, Sir Peter Davis, said about the International Survey:
"This admittedly small scale survey reinforces the conclusion drawn in the government's Skills Audit that we need to improve numeracy skills. It's important to remember, however, that most people in our survey were at school before the introduction of the National Curriculum and regular key stage assessment.
I believe that, with its new remit, the Basic Skills Agency has an important role to play in raising standards. The Agency, with the support of the Department for Education and Employment, is working with the BBC on a campaign to improve numeracy standards - Count Me In. l think that this will do much to make certain that everyone - children, young people and adults - has the sound grasp of basic skills which is essential in the modern world".
Notes
1. The Basic Skills Agency is the national agency for basic skills in England and Wales and is funded mainly by the Government. The Agency receives a grant of about £4.5 million a year.
2. The Patron of the Basic Skills Agency is Her Royal Highness The Princess Royal and the Agency's Chairman is a leading industrialist, Sir Peter Davis, Group Chief Executive of the Prudential Corporation plc.
3. The two surveys available are:
Does Numeracy Matter? Evidence from the National Child Development Study on the Impact of Poor Numeracy on Adult Life. Professor John Bynner and Samantha
Parsons. [Copies are £6.00].
International Numeracy Survey: A comparison of the basic numeracy shills of adults 16-60 in seven countries.
[Copies are available free of charge].
4. These reports have been launched as part of the BBC's Count Me In numeracy campaign. For information about Count Me In contact the BBC Education Press Office.
5. For further information about the surveys contact Jaz Bangar on 0171 405 4017 or 0370 588875.
Send us your thoughts! ......
Copyright © 1997 [BASS]. All rights reserved.