Skills for life

(THEME) 00:03

Annalise

Hi, I'm Annalise...

Hrisanthi

I'm Hrisanthi...

Rosie

I'm Rosie...

Christy 00:08

I'm Christy...

Honor

And I'm Honor... and we're the hosts of the podcast Literacy Legends.

?Host

As a Tasmanian, when you hear the word literacy, what springs to mind?

?Host 00:19

I bet it's the statistic that almost half of Tasmanian adults lack the literacy skills they need to get by day to day.

?Host 00:27

It's worrying,

?Host 00:28

So we wanted to know what's being done about it. Is literacy as big as a challenge, as they say it is?

?Host 00:37

Well, yes, it seems to be. But are there stories of hope? You bet there are.

?Host 00:43

We travelled Tasmania to find just some of the people who are working hard to improve these stats.

?Host

They're stories worth celebrating, of hope and progress, and their projects are making a real difference in people's lives.

?Host 01:05

Join us in this series about literacy in Tasmania.

?Host

Episode 6 - Skills for Life.

(CAFE SOUNDS)

Annalise

Hi. My name is Annalise Haigh, and I'm your host of this episode of Literacy Legends. (CAFE NOISES) We are at Hamlet Coffee Shop in Hobart. I can smell bacon and eggs. I can hear the staff talking. I can hear the coffee tubes, making the milk. It's pretty quiet, not busy just yet.

Amy 01:54

My name is Amy. I am the Participant Engagement Officer here at Hamlet.

Annalise 02:01

What makes Hamlet different to other cafes?

Amy 02:05

At Hamlet, we're a registered charity, and our cafe is a social enterprise. So we train participants, Tasmanians facing barriers to employment. We have a focus on working with people with disability, and we provide training in our cafe and kitchen operations.

Annalise 02:26

Tell me about literacy program. 

Amy 02:29

Yeah, so we received some funding through 2610 last year, which allowed us to employ an adult literacy skills officer. So we have a literacy support person on staff two days a week... we were finding that a lot of our participants had quite low literacy levels, and that was meaning that their progression through our training programs was stalling a little bit, and looked into options, how we might be able to best support them. We started that with Charles, who will meet later today. Charles engaged in some 2610, literacy support through Libraries Tas. And then we looked into that further, and were lucky enough to receive some grant funding to employ someone here at Hamlet. 

(CAFE SOUNDS)

Charles 03:22

My name's Charles, and I did the literacy program here. 

Annalise 03:28

What was school like when you were growing up?

Charles 03:32

Hard. Really was, with my disability, it's like getting to do stuff in class was hard for me because I had... my reading wasn't fast enough, or my writing skills wasn't fast enough, so I was always behind and getting through to the teachers, saying, I can't do this and I can't do that, it's like.. yeah, it was really hard.

Annalise 03:58

What job did you want to to do when you left school?

Charles 04:04

I didn't really have a job plan because I was... working with my dad when I was still at school. So I was doing landscape gardening at a very young age. That's what I did, pretty much, did my whole whole life.

Annalise 04:19

How many jobs did you apply for?

Charles 04:23

Thousands. (LAUGHS) And then I couldn't really find anything. So I really started my own, my own business, or my own employee. So yeah, after I left with my dad and stuff like that. So I used my dad's business to bounce off, to start my own so like I do, like, he'd do the building side of things, and I'd do the outside. So yeah, so I started doing working with myself.

Annalise 04:50

How did your reading and writing skills to get in the way?

Charles 04:56

How did it get in the way? When... I had to read things on the side of poison bottles and stuff like that, and and knowing like knowing how much to put into a mixture of water to use to spray or mix up concrete, how much stuff you needed to put in, stuff, all sorts of stuff, all that.

Annalise 05:22

What things did you do to... avoid having to read?

Charles 05:27

When I learned how to do the dosage, stuff like that, I used to make it like a mental note, like I used to have, like a phone, similar like this, and I'll say the things on my phone, and it would like, tell me how much to put into things.

Annalise 05:44

Who taught you to read, here?

Charles 05:47

Pretty much everyone's like, everyone helped in their own way. Like, if I had trouble with spelling something, I wouldn't have to hesitate to ask them to help me read it or spell it.

Annalise 06:00

How did you feel to learn? 

Charles

Good, happy. Happy to learn, happy to do anything it helps myself and anyone else. 

Annalise 06:13

How was it different to learning something at school?

Charles 06:18

Easier, because it was more one or three people, not like 30 people in a room. So, like, it's easier. 

Annalise 06:28

what are your most proud of?

Charles 06:32

What am I most proud of? Still be having the work. If it wasn't for this place, I wouldn't have a job.

Annalise 06:42

What about outside of work? Has learning to read helped you in other ways.

Charles 06:51

I'm trying to go back through my road rules so I can get a lot and get my license, even though I don't have a car. But like, it's it's it's good to have one (CHUCKLES), and then I'm reading small, small stories about things from out of the newspaper, about other people who are doing it, articles and stuff like that. 

Annalise 07:14

Yeah. What's your perfect job?

Charles 07:18

My perfect job is... the job I've actually got now.

(CAFE NOISE, MUSIC)

Annalise 07:29

What have noticed about Charles since he began his reading program?

Amy 07:36

Charles's confidence has grown so much, not just with his reading and writing, but having the skills to be able to, you know, use shorthand and things like that on the floor, really boosted Charles's confidence and how to navigate, like medical forms and things like that. I think is something that has a broader impact for Charles.

Annalise 08:02

What did customers say about Charles?

Amy 08:07

Customers love Charles. He's always on for a good chat. There were times where we'd have to pull Charles back and say, Come on Charles, come and put the order in like we're here if we've got to serve them coffee as well. But I think Charles is such a welcoming presence in the cafe, and it's really nice to... for other participants who might be a bit more shy as well, to see that confidence in other participants and... as a good role Model. 

Annalise

Thank you. 

Amy

Thank you.

(MUSIC THEME)

?Host 08:40

We acknowledge the traditional owners of this land that we recorded this podcast on, the [?Padua] and [?Pakna] peoples in Lutruwita, Tasmania. We also acknowledge disabled First Nations people. Literacy Legends is hosted by [names], and produced by Honor Marino. It was developed in cooperation with Powerd Media and Print Radio Tasmania.

(THEME ENDS)