The Learning a New Way: AQA Unit Award Scheme Centre

The AQA unit scheme allows anyone via a provider to provide evidence that their child is able to achieve learning objectives and pass the unit award.

There are over 20,000 unit awards, and there is even the possibility to create your own unit awards, or tweak existing awards to adapt for your child. For example we altered a Google map award to using the walk through option rather than following the written directions.

The AQA unit awards are certified at different levels however they are not qualifications as such. Many of the units map onto GCSE or functional skills which can be used demonstrate the level at which your child is working and what they have accomplished. If you click on English or Maths and scroll down, the Entry Level units are mapped at the bottom of the page.

There are awards for things as simple as getting a glass of water to very complex awards at GCSE level. The units can be found here: https://www.aqa.org.uk/programmes/unit-award-scheme/unit-search

Try putting in a word like Christmas, Minecraft, drawing, hoovering, music or Disney and units will appear. It is possible to filter by level too. Each unit done via Learning a New Way usually costs £6 and there is a fee to register with AQA – currently £29.99. Higher level or functional skills awards cost more.

I decided to use the unit awards in several ways. First of all to map against the English and Maths Entry level awards so that I could confidentially tell a future employer what level my son had been verified as achieving in each subject. Secondly, I used the awards to demonstrate that my son could do a range of life skills from hoovering, to emptying the dishwasher, to cleaning windows. Finally, I used the awards to map onto topic work and other hobbies such as choir, recycling, oceans, music and art. The unit awards are giving us a focus to aim towards in English and Maths along with stretching my son’s curriculum and knowledge in other ways. We completed a unit on musical instruments this morning and thoroughly enjoyed listening to pieces of music and playing the instruments. It was lovely to do a different type of award.

The awards are a good way to demonstrate learning or progress towards your child’s outcomes which has been independently verified by external assessors. Every learning objective needs to be verified. Sometimes this is simply a written statement with a piece of work demonstrating the achievement, but most of the time I use photographs and videos to demonstrate clearly what has been achieved. I have found myself going above and beyond to be able demonstrate that the outcomes have been achieved. Sometimes I have had to demonstrate in several different ways that Toby had achieved the learning objectives to ensure the assessor knew that he had done it independently. I was able to get our tutors and teachers to help verify too.

The AQA unit awards are open to all. Anyone can sign up and then you are free to work at your own place and submit awards as you complete them.