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Working With Others
Why teach Working with Others?
It is often assumed that we naturally develop the skills to work with
others. Many learners, though, start their post-16 education with poor
or patchy sets of skills. Although good teaching involves working in groups
this does not mean that the individuals within them are working as a team.
This implies that learners must be encouraged and given the opportunity
to learn these skills.
The aim of the specifications
for Working with Others is to encourage candidates to develop
and demonstrate their ability to work cooperatively with others
to achieve shared objectives. This sharing of objectives is
important.
Experience shows
that teamworking:
- increases energy and creativity
- makes the most of a range of skills and knowledge
- improves understanding, communication and a sense of shared
purpose
- improves efficiency.
Links
Links to curriculum areas
The following quotations
from the Communication unit all imply that
the student must take the needs of others into account:
- Take part in a one-to-one discussion and a group
discussion (L1)
- Respond appropriately to others (L1)
- Adapt what you say to suit different situations (L2)
- Listen carefully to what others say (L2)
- Develop points and ideas, with an awareness of others'
feelings, beliefs and opinions (L3)
- Encourage others to contribute (L3)
- Listen and respond sensitively (L3)
- Respond perceptively to contributions from others
(L4)
Action planning
relates to Improving Own Learning and Performance
and Problem Solving.
The ICT key skill makes the following points:
- Candidates should know how to make the style of presentation
consistent so that people using will find it clear and easy
to follow (L1)
- Develop the presentation to suit your purpose and
audience (L2)
- Candidates should be able to use the views of other
people in making improvements to the format and style of
materials (L3 )
- Evidence of purposeful use of email is presented (L3)
- Candidates should take into account the needs of their
audience (L3)
- Use the views of others to guide refinements to content
and design (L4)
Working with others is central to Citizenship and PSHE.
Both are rich sources of opportunities to develop the skills to work with
others.
Business Studies is a useful vehicle for working with
others. Some courses have specific units closely related to Working with
Others - AVCE Unit 19 Motivating and Developing People, for example. The
documentation and support material relating to such courses may also be
useful.
Many GCSE
and AS/A2 programmes, and all GNVQ
and AVCE programmes, involve students preparing
coursework projects or assignments. While students' work must
be individually assessed for the purpose of the main qualification,
there is always plenty of scope for teamworking, especially
in the early stages of planning research and collecting data.
Employers involved in work experience are becoming
more familiar with the wider key skills and are often willing to help
generate opportunities for skills enhancement and evidence. Within work
experience, students should be encouraged to review and evaluate.
For Working with Others, the main learning experience will be that of
meeting and working with a completely new group of people, all of whom
will be older than the student and have more authority. While students
on work experience may not always have the opportunity to plan their work
and develop process skills to any great extent, they should be able to
demonstrate their personal qualities and practise and improve their interpersonal
skills.
Many organisations, such as the Royal Armouries and ASDA for example,
are now geared up for organised visits. They have a vested
interest in ensuring that the employees of tomorrow have the skills to
work with others. Many organisations are willing to share the training
they give to their staff with the staff of tomorrow.
The technology curriculum has close links with Working
with Others. This is particularly evident in relation to production lines/batch
production.
There are also links to the NVQs, especially in units
about customer care and working relationships. Enrichment programmes
involve students working together in the plan–do–review cycle.
They are, therefore, ideal for delivering Working with Others, eg when
planning an event, reviewing group progress or fundraising.
Personal development
- Working with Others is an opportunity for students to demonstrate
personal qualities, which are not always fully celebrated in their other
areas of study.
- Working with Others can be used to support students in
tackling issues to do with social, cultural and personal
identity, and associated values.
- When students have a framework of skills that makes them more aware
of the cooperative skills they have, they will more likely to be aware
of the skills they need to develop further.
- Personal life, part-time jobs, dealing with relationships.
The rules and conventions of all social activities require
people to cooperate, even when they are competing against
each other, as in many kinds of sport. People need to cooperate
with each other whether they are planning simply to meet
another person or are planning a large-scale social event.
While the skills and qualities needed for a successful social
life are seldom expressed in the formal terms of Working
with Others, they are nevertheless the same.
- School life is a microcosm of the outside world and presents many
opportunities to work with others. Lunch time and after-school clubs,
library duties, and sports activities are useful development tools.
Many schools encourage students to develop their skills by working alongside
office staff in school - on reception duties, for example.
- The skill of working with others is intrinsic to our
everyday lives and this is reflected in the skills, qualities
and knowledge needed at each stage of the process.
Progression to HE and employment
The focus of the
units is on helping students learn to become valued members
of a team - one of the most vital skills for employability
and, increasingly, for academic and vocational education,
and training at all levels.
In surveys, employers have consistently put the wider key skills at the
top of their list - in particular Working with Others. This is becoming
increasingly true as more and more employees have direct contact with
customers.
There is no doubt that employers are increasingly vocal about the competencies
that they expect from their employees. The Skills needs in Britain
survey states very clearly that the skills most lacking in the UK`s 16
to 24 year olds are: technical and practical skills; general communication
skills; customer-handling skills; teamworking skills;
computer literacy skills; problem-solving skills; management skills;
basic literacy and numeracy skills; and managing own development. The
skills involved in working with others are readily identifiable in this
list. See Key Skills - Progression
Many organisations explicitly look for the skills of working with others
or teamworking when assessing potential new recruits. Teamwork is often
the central issue at assessment centres. The specifications give a structure
by which students can demonstrate their success; this can be very useful
on a curriculum vitae or an application form.
As the key skills are specified in
Modern Apprenticeships, learners who can demonstrate their
competence before commencement of MAs are going to be particularly
attractive candidates to both colleges and employers.
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Summary of this section