Academic literacy, numeracy and language
Literacy, numeracy and language skills can all be developed to help guide your research.
- What is academic literacy, numeracy and language?
- Why is academic literacy, numeracy and language important?
- How can you improve your language skills?
- How can you improve your academic literacy and numeracy?
How confident are you with academic literacy, numeracy and language?
Having strong literacy, numeracy and language skills really can enhance your research.
Read our guide below to learn more on how to improve these skills.
What is academic literacy, numeracy and language?
Using terminology and syntax appropriate to your discipline, you will be able to communicate well academic literacy and numeracy skills, whether this be through understanding, interpreting, creating or communicating.
Why is academic literacy, numeracy and language important?
Using the language of your discipline, it is vital to be able to communicate and disseminate your research effectively. Being able to communicate your research to non-specialist audiences is becoming increasingly more important.
These skills can enable you to:
- Adjust your language to non-specialist audiences for greater clarity
- Work with statistics
- Have knowledge of terminology from related disciplines or foreign languages demanded by your subject
How can you improve your language skills?
- Ensure you are competent in, and comfortable with, the language, including the technical language, used within your discipline. There may be unfamiliar terms used that are not a part of your specialism – ask for help if you are not sure
- Are there other disciplines you would like to know more about, to do inter-disciplinary research? Familiarise yourself with the style, terminologies and languages used by those researchers in other disciplines
- Consider taking lessons in other languages if there are important sources written in other languages that you wish to access non-translated copies of. Check if your institution offers any free language courses.
How can you improve your academic literacy and numeracy?
- Develop your writing skills so that you are competent at writing for specialist and non-specialist audiences. Learn what each audience needs and how you can best communicate your research to these needs. Your institution should provide workshops or courses on communicating to non-academic audiences.
- How can you best utilise technology to communicate your research? Consider the benefits of blogs, social media and other forms of media to convey your message(s) to your audience(s).
- Can you pass on your expertise in literacy and language use to other colleagues or researchers?
- If your research involves statistics, are there any further courses you can take to further your mathematical skills?
- Keep up to date with the latest news on technology, media, mathematical tools, techniques and procedures related to your area and share your knowledge to others.
Final things to takeaway
- Using the language of your discipline, it is vital to be able to communicate and disseminate your research effectively. Being able to communicate your research to non-specialist audiences is becoming increasingly more important.
- Ensure you are competent in, and comfortable with, the language, including the technical language, used within your discipline.
- Develop your writing skills so that you are competent at writing for specialist and non-specialist audiences.