Cash For Kids day

Thanks to everyone who took part in our fundraiser for Cash for Kids, either by wearing something festive or donating to our collection.

We raised a total of £110, with people choosing to wear Christmas jumpers, Christmas hats, a bit of tinsel or Christmas jewellery!

Cash for Kids use the donations to lend a helping hand to disabled or disadvantaged children in the local area.

Thank you all for helping another worthy cause this Christmas!

Gail

The Learning Shop donates to the Food Bank

Instead of spending money on "Secret Santa" gifts this year, the staff decided to make donations to the food bank. The response to this has been great with tutors and students also joining in the spirit of giving! Thanks to all who have taken part in donating to this cause and adding to this fantastic donation for people in need this Christmas!

Gail

It's Book Week Scotland!

Staff, students and tutors across Adult Learning are taking part in Book Week Scotland.

If you would like to take part, all you have to do is take a photo of yourself holding a book you've enjoyed, write a couple of sentences about why you enjoyed it and send it to Gail at gail.douglas@south-ayrshire.gov.uk - and I'll add it to our presentation which will be running in The Learning Shop for the next couple of weeks!

Every entry will receive a free book from our stock at The Learning Shop and will also be entered into a prize draw to win a book token.

Go on, have a go! Let's get everyone reading!

ESOL tutor training

There will be an opportunity to attend  ESOL Tutor Training on

Wednesday 28th October 2015 from 9.30am to 4pm
Wednesday 4th November 2015 from 10am to 4pm.

If you are interested please contact the Learning Shop for more details on 01292263304


We can only accommodate 12 tutors in the Adult Learning Room in the John Pollock Centre Ayr so early booking will guarantee you a place.  Please confirm your attendance by 14th October. A light lunch will be provided each training day and if you have any dietary requirements please let us know.

 

Volunteer Tutor Awards

Congratulations to the seventeen volunteers who recently passed Adult Learning’s Volunteer Tutor Training course. They were a really great group who contributed so much during their course.

On Tuesday 11^th August, they met at The Learning Shop to receive their certificates from Councillor Margaret Toner, the Lifelong Learning portfolio holder for South Ayrshire Council.

We look forward to working with them all in the months ahead!

Eric & Julia

Resources for ESOL tutors

A new list of useful websites for ESOL tutors has been added to our Resources section of the Blog - click the resources tab at the top of the page, then click the link to tutor paperwork and you'll find the document in the list.

Gail

New members of staff

Ellen and Lesley

We are delighted to welcome two new staff members to our team!

Ellen Thomson will work in The Learning Shop as our Receptionist and Clerical Assistant in the afternoons, while Lesley Shepherd is our new Literacy Development Worker for Maybole and Ayr.

We look forward to working with them and hope they are both happy in their new jobs!

Gail

ESOL Celebration Evening

On 18^th June 2015 we celebrated the achievements of our ESOL learners at the John Pollock Centre Ayr.   This is the third year we have organised the ESOL celebration evening and this year proved to be another successful event.  The evening allowed all our ESOL learners and their families to come together and enjoy an international buffet and a chance to sample some of the international cuisine prepared by our learners

Family members watched proudly as around twenty learners came forward to receive an accolade from Ayrshire College Curriculum Manager Arlene Trapp.  The learners throughout the year were offered the possibility to achieve an SQA accredited award whilst attending their community classes.  This was all possible by means of the ESOL partnership agreement with Ayrshire College.  The teaching and learning which takes place within our community ESOL classes allows for learners to achieve an Access 2 or Access3 level accreditation.  This opportunity can also serve as a pathway to college ESOL provision.

We also took the opportunity to thank Eileen Opiolka for her dedicated hard work as a volunteer and ESOL tutor.  Eileen after many years of teaching ESOL has decided to retire and we presented her with a token of our appreciation for being such a valuable member of the team.

On the whole the evening demonstrated how successful our ESOL learners are and how grateful they are to the Learning Shop tutors for all the support and encouragement they receive throughout the year.

Ann

We're winners!

A joint venture between The Learning Shop and Turning Point Scotland has been recognised at the Adult Learning Impact Awards 2015.

Turning Point Scotland opened a gift shop, Rosie's Retro, in the Kyle Centre just before Christmas to provide work experience and retail training to some of their service users. These are adults with learning difficulties and The Learning Shop team were asked to provide literacy and numeracy support to enable these learners to make the most of their training.



Gail provided weekly workshops to this group of learners, developing the communication and numeracy skills needed for retail work. All members of the group are now happy, confident workers within Rosie's Retro.

We were invited to the Scottish Parliament building in Edinburgh for the awards ceremony where we were presented with the Innovation Award. Everyone involved with the group is delighted with their achievement!

Gail

Staff update

As some of you may know, Zoe Kennedy, Literacy Development Worker, has moved on to pastures new! We wish her luck in her future ventures!

The rest of the literacy team are working hard to keep The Learning Shop running smoothly while we are short staffed. In the meantime, blog updates may not be quite so regular!

Please get in touch by phone on 01292 263304 if we can help you with anything or you can e-mail Eric at eric.lindsay@south-ayrshire.gov.uk or Julia at julia.wooley@south-ayrshire.gov.uk.

We hope to be able to welcome a new Admin Assistant and a new Literacy Development Worker soon!

Gail

Wee inspirational quote!

“A good head and good heart are

always a formidable combination.

But when you add to that a literate

tongue or pen, then you have

something very special.”

Nelson Mandela

Inspection of the learning community surrounding Carrick Academy

In January of this year the learning community surrounding Carrick Academy underwent an inspection by Education Scotland. The inspectors met with some of our tutors and learners in the area as well as members of staff and we were very pleased, along with our colleagues and partners, with the feedback received in the report. The full report was published on the 10th March and can be found on the Education Scotland website www.educationscotland.gov.uk.
The report stated, among other very positive things, that the impact on participants was excellent, described as outstanding and sector leading. I'd like to thank all our learners and tutors who took part in the inspection and hope that everyone feels proud of the work taking place in the area.

Zoe Kennedy

A lovely success story

I studied so hard for the Life in the UK test but just couldn't get enough to pass - I was so disappointed that I failed the test twice by just a few marks and didn't know what else I could do to improve.

Then I realised I couldn't study alone because I needed more explanation.

Luckily Ann reassured me that this was normal and arranged for a learning shop tutor to help me.

I saw my tutor Marlene twice and week and the difference she made was amazing. She was so patient and helpful, she explained things really well and made me sit lots of practice tests which I passed easily.

This really gave me the confidence to try again.  And guess what, I passed!
I will never forget that moment when I finally had the pass certificate in my hand.
My wife was so proud of me and my mum cried when I called her to tell her the good news.
All that time and test fees were finally worth it. Three days later I got my ILR and look forward to getting my British Citizenship soon.
Thank you Learning Shop.
Hamdi Zenati

“A guid Scottish nicht”

On Thursday 12^th February 2015 in the John Pollock Centre Ayr we had our Scottish celebration evening.  Our invited guests were our learners, their family and friends and Greg Cassidy, Arlene Trapp and Orsyla Dunn, our partners from Ayrshire College. We had the pleasure of having volunteers from the Royal Scottish Country Dance Society.  Wilma Brown who is the secretary of the Ayr branch very kindly helped us with dancing routines for our ceilidh and David Ross the accordionist played traditional Scottish dancing music.  

Our evening started with Rhonda Leith our team leader who welcomed everyone.  Eileen Opiolka one of our ESOL tutors addressed the haggis.  Everyone enjoyed a “ guid” Scottish dinner of Scotch broth or cream of vegetable soup which was prepared by the chef at the John Pollock Centre.   Offerings of haggis neeps and tatties were also on the menu!

We also had the pleasure of listening to Bivas play Auld Lang Syne on the trombone and then later, we all got emotional when the young Kyle Academy pupil sang Caledonia.  Eileen’s learners also gave us a couple of versus of “ Yi cannae shuv  yer Granny aff a bus” 

The evening was a great success and everyone enjoyed themselves.  A big “Thank You” to our ESOL tutors Liza Donaldson, Eileen Opiolka, Irene Lamont and Susan Wilson for all their help.  Thanks to Wendy Kerr our admin guru who welcomed everyone and made sure they were all directed into the cafe area.

The evening proved to be a good example of collaborative partnership working to allow our international learners and their families feel part of the Scottish community.

To the next “nicht oot”                                                                

Ann

Volunteer with us!

Here is some recent feedback, given to Ann Gentilomo, from one of our volunteer tutors: “My training and tutoring experience with the Learning Shop have been valuable parts of my professional development as a teacher,  and they have helped me greatly in work I have done later with other colleges and educational providers.”

If you’d like to get involved in supporting some of our lovely learners please get in touch with us on 01292 263304, we’d love to hear from you and would welcome the opportunity to meet and tell you a bit more about us. We deliver a tutor training programme to ensure you have all the skills required to help an adult to improve the things they've told us they want to get better at.

So what are you waiting for? We look forward to your call, Zoe.

Activities for over 55s at 'the book and bun'

Fond farewell to Heather

It’s with a mixture of sadness and happiness that I have to announce that Heather has moved on to pastures new!  She has managed to secure a permanent job in a local Primary School and everyone at The Learning Shop wishes her well in her new job.

She has been a great asset to our Team – always smiling, helpful – willing to go the extra mile for students, tutors and colleagues. It has been great having someone younger in the office to keep us in line!

She will be sorely missed and hard to be replaced.

Wendy(wendy.kerr@south-ayrshire.gov.uk)

Cinderella

In the lead up to Christmas some of our students were involved in the production of “Cinderella” – a pantomime produced by Recovery Ayr. Tickets were free but donations were taken for Cash For Kids. The event was a huge success and we would like to say a great big “WELL DONE!” to all who were involved in making this such an enjoyable show!

Gail