When looking for solutions for organizing the Center for Continuing Education and Vocational Development for students with intellectual disabilities, we were looking for possibly universal strategies to be used in various conditions and organizational systems functioning in Polish special education. Originally, we planned to develop a comprehensive organizational structure, but empathetic and diagnostic work led us to somewhat bitter reflections that in the current legal situation and in the perspective of constant underfinancing of the public sector and difficulties in implementing cross-sectoral activities on financial grounds, we decided to focus on more methodical solutions that could constitute the foundation for this type of facility, regardless of the final organizational structure.
The starting point was to identify the labor market in terms of the availability of job offers with a real promise of employment for people with more severe disabilities. As a result of many conversations and discussions with representatives of the Sosnowiec Labor Office, the following job positions were selected as potentially promising employment:
- General construction helper, employee in small production and services
- Small production line worker, warehouse worker, packer.
- Pet sitter
- Kitchen help, baker’s helper
- Housekeeping worker, hotel service, janitor
- Gardener’s assistant, green areas caretaker
- A farm worker on a small farm
- Office worker, administrative assistant.
These areas are identical to those proposed for education at school level. Looking for a formula that could provide real support for conducting post-school improvement courses, a decision was made to develop a catalog of basic skills for individual positions. These are sets of skills, ordered in terms of complexity and advancement, necessary to undertake activities in selected professional areas. Their mastery and generalization to various working conditions and situations may be an indicator of achieving real readiness for employment in the indicated areas.
In addition to the list of necessary skills, the developed catalogs also contain elements typical of Formative Performance Assessment – self-assessment and feedback for the teacher, thus enabling direct observation of the achievements of course participants. Tips for working using this method can be found in other documents developed in the AION project.
How to work with Skill Catalogs?
We propose two paths of working with their use, A and B:
Path A – the starting point is the workplace. Based on the characteristics of a specific workplace, we prepare skill cards that allow you to acquire the skills specified in the catalog based on specific materials and tools appropriate for the initial workplace.
What does it look like in practice?
- A carpentry workshop declares its willingness to employ a young man with intellectual disabilities to assemble previously prepared furniture. Work using basic hand tools, furniture boards and 2-3 types of connections.
- A teacher/employee of the center first looks for a potential employee – for this purpose, he or she can use career pre-orientation surveys as well as functional tests developed in the project.
- Together with the employer and the future employee, they determine the details regarding individual skills from the skills catalog: general construction worker – part one – “I can combine various materials.” We define a detailed set of tools, materials and activities occurring at a given workplace.
- Based on the above data, we prepare a skills card, e.g. Master of kitchen cabinets, which consists of exercises in the knowledge of materials (furniture board, screws, eccentric joints, wooden dowels, pins), skills in using tools (screwdriver, screwdrivers, hammer, carpentry clamps, possibly nail gun). These are isolated attempts to improve individual skills related to assembling furniture.
- The key task of the course is to make a specific product as independently as possible (in this case, e.g. assembling a kitchen cabinet). It is important that the product meets the real challenges of the target workplace.
- The training ends with evaluation in the form of an analysis of the performance card, self-assessment and feedback from the teacher.
Path B – the starting point is the student’s interests. In a situation where no specific job offers are currently available, and at the same time we observe the student’s or graduate’s predispositions, interests or will to develop in a specific professional direction, we create a course process based on the student’s resources.
How it works in practice:
Tomek really likes working with wood, he likes screwing, nailing and sanding various materials. He is quite independent in this, but not very precise and needs step-by-step instructions on how to perform each activity. He dreams of working in a carpentry workshop that produces and assembles furniture.
- Tomek and I are analyzing the catalog of skills: general construction worker. We perform the first self-assessment to determine the declared skill level. Together with Tomek, we also decide what product we would like to make as the essence of the course, it may be a kitchen cabinet, table, shelf, box, let’s assume that we decide on a kitchen cabinet made of furniture board.
- Similarly to Path A, we develop a skills card, e.g. Master carpenter, which consists of exercises in knowledge of materials, skills in using tools and exercises in performing specific works. In Path B, however, they are broader – as far as possible, we implement all the content included in a given skill catalog. If the assessment of competencies at the entrance is reliable and not declarative, you can focus more on partially or not at all mastered skills, using the fully mastered skills as a resource for educating those less developed.
- The key task of the course is, as in Path A, making a specific product as independently as possible (in this case, e.g. assembling a kitchen cabinet).
- The training ends with evaluation in the form of an analysis of the performance card, self-assessment and feedback from the teacher.
- Throughout the course, it is recommended to collect photos and recordings indicating the student’s level of competence in the form of, for example, an e-portfolio. This will support the recruitment process.