Welcome to the Week

Lifelong learning is already happening in your teaching and learning practice.

Every day, students are developing a wide range of skills. You might hear these described in different ways, soft skills, transferable skills, durable skills, human capability skills, or even employability skills.

Throughout this course, when we refer to skills, we are referring to all of these. This includes both technical or discipline-specific skills, and broader skills such as communication, problem-solving, critical thinking, and collaboration.

A note on language

There are many different ways to define skills, capability, and competence, and the terms are often used differently across institutions, sectors, frameworks, and countries.

In this course, we use the following working definitions.

Skills are things a learner can do. They may be technical, discipline-specific, transferable, durable, human, or employability-related. Skills can be developed through study, work, projects, placements, volunteering, community participation, and everyday experience.

Capability is the learner’s ability to use and combine skills, knowledge, judgement, and experience in context. Capability is more than having a skill in isolation. It is about being able to apply what you know and can do in different situations.

Competence is the demonstrated ability to meet an expected standard in a particular context. It often involves evidence that a learner can perform a task, role, or practice to an agreed level.

Put simply:

• skills are what learners can do
• capability is how learners use and adapt what they can do in context
• competence is the demonstrated standard of performance

These definitions are not intended to replace the language used in your institution or sector. They provide a shared starting point for this course as we explore how learning, skills, and capability can be made more visible.

Some skills and capabilities are more visible than others.

Technical and subject-specific skills are often easier to see because they are directly connected to what is being taught. In a subject like IT, for example, students are explicitly learning to code. That learning is visible, structured, and often assessed.

At the same time, students are also developing other skills. They are testing ideas, debugging, analysing patterns, and adapting their approach when something doesn’t work.

These skills are just as important, but they are often less visible, less explicitly named, and harder for students to recognise and describe.

Image by Cup of Couple, pexels.com

Think about a cheese and wine platter

Some things need to be used quickly. Fresh cheeses, soft, delicate, best enjoyed now. Leave them too long, and they lose their value.

Other things improve over time. A good wine develops, deepens, becomes more complex. It carries forward and still holds its value in new contexts.

Skills can work in a similar way.

Some skills are more perishable. Specific tools, content, or techniques that change quickly as the world evolves.

Other skills are more durable. They remain relevant across subjects, jobs, and life. Skills like communication, problem-solving, critical thinking, and collaboration.

Both matter and just like cheese and wine, they complement each other. But in a world where technology and AI are changing rapidly, it is these more durable skills that help students adapt, continue learning, and apply what they know in new situations.

Every day in your institutions, students are developing these skills.

When they:

• work through a complex problem
• collaborate with others
• revise their thinking
• try again when something doesn’t work

they are not just completing an activity or assessment. They are building skills.

Over time, these skills begin to shape what students can actually do. This is where capability starts to emerge.

And yet, much of this learning remains invisible. Students complete the task. They submit the work. They move on. And if you ask:

• What did you learn to do?
• What skills did you use?
• Where could you use this again?

many students struggle to answer. Not because the learning isn’t there, but because it hasn’t been named, noticed, or made visible.

Skills Literacy

This is where the concept of skills literacy becomes important. Skills literacy is about recognising and articulating skills. It helps make learning visible, not by adding more, but by noticing what is already there and making it explicit.

Throughout this week, you will begin to explore these ideas.

The focus is not on changing what you do, but on developing a clearer way of seeing and describing the learning that is already happening.

As you move through the activities, start with a simple question

If lifelong learning is already happening in our teaching and learning, why does it not always feel visible?