Are you considering an apprenticeship? In this post the team from Woodspeen Training outline everything you need to know.
What is an apprenticeship?
- An apprenticeship is a training course within a vocational setting. What this means is that you get to ‘earn while you learn’. An apprenticeship placement means you are doing the job whilst you are formally learning all about what that job entails, hopefully leading to a qualification at the end of the course.
“The online learning is interactive with a personal tutor and group of other learners. This allows for conversation and questions throughout the session which means if I have any questions they can be answered there and then. This is a much more interactive and engaging way of learning, rather than reading content from a screen by myself”.
Why is it something I would want to do?
- An apprenticeship is just like going to work. You work within a team at your place of employment, but also have external training and support from a team of dedicated tutors. An extended network to help you throughout your learning journey.
“The content of my course is delivered in a professional yet friendly way. I like being taught within a group of other learners that are all at the same stage on the course as me. We talk about our own experiences and learn a lot from each other as well as our tutor”.
Why might an apprenticeship work for me?
- It’s a chance to gain a qualification in a business sector you may have an interest it. After successful completion of the course, the qualification is yours and you can take this with you to prove your learning and knowledge to other businesses.
- Apprenticeships are a way of formally learning about the business sector in which you work. They are taught to a set of standards set out by the institute of apprenticeships, so you will learn about all the aspects of the job role, not just the parts that your employer wants to teach you.
“Weekly sessions keep me on track with my coursework, the course is useful and relevant to ongoing work within my store. It is taught in a step-by-step manner that is easy to take in and understand. The teaching sessions are short enough that the amount of new information each week isn’t overwhelming. We have a chance to digest and understand the content, practicing our new skills across the week, before attending the next teaching session the following week”.
I’m not very academic, how will I cope with new learning?
- Apprenticeships are set up in a way that compliment and enhance what you will be learning ‘on the job’.
- Sessions start with the basics and work their way up through the course, building on previously learnt knowledge – you’re not expected to know everything within a week
- You are assigned a personal tutor who helps to teach and guide you through all the course structure. Questions are set after a teaching session to check your retention of the content of that session. If there are any gaps in your knowledge, then your tutor will feedback in detail to allow you to reflect on what went wrong and how that can be corrected.
As a Tutor I have seen my learners blossom throughout the course, becoming confident and knowledgeable individuals. All of the tutors here are qualified and registered dispensing opticians so we can not only teach the content of the course, but we can also confidently teach from experience, making the course and the sessions very relatable to the workplace environment.
“I know I can go to my tutor if I have any concerns, but I also have the support of my work colleagues and supervisor in store”.
With over 30 years’ experience, Woodspeen Training is a well-established provider of Level 2 – Level 5 Apprenticeship and skills programmes. In the past year it has also begun to offer optical assistant apprenticeships.
