NOVA - Numeracy Oriented to Vocational Authenticity
The project addresses the gap between numeracy taught in European VET education and the numeracy relevant to a profession and daily life. Millions of people in Europe have difficulty with numeracy, the lack of this knowledge impacts their employment, health, finance and social participation.
Objective
The project strengthens numeracy education in VET, with a focus on inclusion and diversity. It creates a learning environment that builds confidence and reduces maths anxiety among VET students with activities that link maths lessons to daily life and professional practice. In this way, the project aims to improve student motivation and basic skills and to reduce early school leaving. It also fosters inclusive teaching for diverse learner groups and supports teachers’ continuous professional development and awareness.
Richtext
In collaboration with CPFIP Los Enlaces (Spain) and the Numeracy Practorate (the Netherlands), the project promotes international knowledge exchange, strengthens HU’s international network. A practorate is a research group within a VET institution.
Results
The expected results of the project are:
- Rich descriptions of good practices
- Visual outputs (e.g., poster or infographic, video)
- Advice, structural support, didactic strategies for successful numeracy lessons
- Increased confidence in numeracy related tasks of VET students in daily life and professional context
- Greater international awareness of numeracy in VET education
- Expanded national and international network for all project partners
Approach
The project centres on international learning activities for VET teachers including school visits, workshops, and reflection sessions. Through co-creation, the partners identify good practices, challenges and solutions, and share results online and in practice, strengthening teaching quality and impact in VET.
Impact on education or professional practice
At HU, the project enriches the VET numeracy teacher training programme with vocationally oriented insights into numeracy. It also offers pre-service teachers of Spanish real-life translation assignments and an introduction to VET. It contributes to health numeracy to the Nursing programme. Within the VET sector, it strengthens teachers’ numeracy teaching methods, which has a positive impact on VET students’ future careers. VET teachers also benefit from the cross-border collaboration.
Collaboration
