Adult Literacy, Functional English, and GCSE Resources

Updated Apr 19 2024 (corrections made to pages 1&3 of the main PDF and page 2 of "Your Budget")

This resources uses the Spring 2024 budget and makes it accessible for learners on L1 and L2 English courses. The resource gives them the budget break down and some comprehension questions based on L1 and L2 reading exams. 

Learners are then asked to design their own budget and think about why they would give money to certain areas outlined in the budget. 

Graphic organiser to aid learners in their discovery of vivacious vocabulary that they can use in their L1 -L2 Functional Skills English writing exams.

Editor's notes

A beautifully presented organiser that covers all the topics that could appear in  Functional Skills English writing assessments (hobbies, learning to drive, fund raising, health and fitness, holidays, technology, etc. etc.). Could also be used for spelling assessment.

What is a Staycation and why are they a good idea for Brits in 2021?  Slides for L1 and L2 English learners to find out more about the staycation, and planning their own, while building their English skills.

Editor's note

Planning sheet to support talk/presentation planning around the theme of food from a different culture. 

Editor's note

This very useful sheet is linked to slide 8 of the Black History Month PPT  (also from Stephanie) but can be used independently. Ideal for Level 1 talks and Level 2 presentations.

Black History Month slides for English Functional Skills. Covers a broad range of skills such as discussion points, comprehension, working out vocabulary from context and/or with a dictionary, language features, organisational features, fact and opinion, and punctuation. 

Editor's note

I put this together when I found so many of my learners trying to hone their employability skills did not know what a lot of the words on job descriptions meant. 

Resource 1 (Definition matching cards: job skills and attributes): I laminated these and cut them up and they worked in pairs or threes to match them up.

There are two other linked resources, as below, to help students with getting to grips with the keywords used in Job Descriptions and Person Specifications. 

A reading comprehension exercise looking at organisational features and why they have been used, specialist language, purpose of text, picking out information.  There are also tasks to get the students looking at words they are not sure of and using a dictionary.  

There is an accompanying written task to create a leaflet using the information in the text.  I have also included a basic 'how to create a leaflet' guide.

Editor's notes

These three simple resources are aimed for teaching the layout features and conventions of informal and formal letter writing.  There are three templates: 

During the Covid-19 lockdown I started working online in Google Classroom and created this L1-2 writing task (and an accompanying introductory presentation) in Google Docs / Slides. Use the presentation to introduce learners (if needed) to Captain Tom and his remarkable achievement for the NHS (national health service) during the Covid-19 crisis.  Slides also provide links to related news articles (important for background information and also for demonstrating the layout and language features of articles). 

How to format and plan a formal letter or email for English functional skills.
Word document / template.

Editor’s note
Two very useful editable Word documents – one for a letter, one for an email.
[5/12/17] Minor edits to the formal letter template