The article examines what teachers of adult immigrant students understand by ‘basic skills’ and ‘study skills’, and how they form the pedagogy of basic skills based on assessments. Basic skills include literacy, numeracy, and problem-solving skills, in technologically advanced environments. The data was collected during supplementary professional training for teachers. It consists of assessments and learning tasks that the participating teachers had prepared, and of the teachers’ reflections. The data was analysed using theory-related content analysis. The results show that the participating teachers often considered each basic skill in isolation. They did not necessarily take account of the skills that adult immigrant students had acquired informally. During the training, the teachers’ understanding of students’ resources and overlaps in skills deepened, and they were setting more functional learning goals and tasks than before. However, it was still challenging to implement many-sided assessments that would guide learning.