Search Results for
"Vocational education"

Problem based learning (PBL) arguably represents the most significant development in education over the past five decades. It has been promoted as the curriculum of choice, and since its introduction in the 1960's, has been widely adopted by many medical and dental schools. PBL has been the subject of much published literature but ironically, very little high quality evidence exists to advocate its efficacy and subsequently justify the widespread curriculum change. The purpose of this review is to classify and interpret the available evidence and extract relevant conclusions. In addition, it is the intent to propose recommendations regarding the relative benefits of PBL compared with conventional teaching. The literature was searched using PubMed, ERIC and PsycLIT. Further articles were retrieved from the reference lists of selected papers. Articles were chosen and included according to specific selection criteria. Studies were further classified as randomised controlled trials (RCTs) or comparative studies. These studies were then analysed according to intervention type: whole curricula comparisons and single educational interventions of shorter duration. At the level of RCTs and comparative studies (whole curricula), no clear difference was observed between PBL and conventional teaching. Paradoxically, it was only comparative studies of single PBL intervention in a traditional curriculum that yielded results that were consistently in favour of PBL. Further research is needed to investigate the possibility that multiple PBL interventions in a traditional curriculum could be more effective than an exclusively PBL programme. In addition, it is important to address the potential benefits of PBL in relation to life-long learning of health care professionals. © 2010 John Wiley & Sons A/S.

A detailed philosophical debate on the nature of expertise is long overdue and Dimensions of Expertise opens up that debate. Christopher Winch firstly explores an account of know-how, derived primarily from the pioneering work of Gilbert Ryle, and moves on to relate this epistemological debate to discussions concerning the nature of expertise in vocational and professional education, including attempts to provide a theory of expertise. © Christopher Winch 2010. All rights reserved.

Teaching Thinking Skills by Steve Johnson was initially published by the Philosophy of education Society of Great Britain in 2000. In this new edition, Johnson has updated his argument, Harvey Siegel has contributed a counter-argument and Christopher Winch has provided a foreword and afterword drawing the debates together. The issues debated in this new edition of Teaching Thinking Skills include: Do thinking skills exist? What are the aims of education? Can thinking skill be taught? Are thinking skills transferable? Teaching Thinking Skills raises issues not only for those concerned with thinking skills per se but more broadly for those concerned with the role of thinking in professional and vocational activities and with the extent to which abilities are broad or narrow, transferable or non-transferable. © Part 2 Harvey Siegel 2010.

The chapters constituting this volume were all originally papers contributed to the Fifth International Basil Bernstein Symposium at Cardiff University, Wales in July 2008. They reflect the continuing vibrancy of the worldwide work that characterises the application of his ideas to educational policy and practice. Their diversity is evident, while their common thread is continuing devotion, noted in earlier volumes, to ‘putting Bernsteinian concepts to work’ (Moore et al., 2006). They could not possibly reflect the complete range of Fifth Symposium presentations but do illustrate how relevant Bernstein’s concerns are in offering insight to our contemporary troubles. More than a third of the papers offered at the symposium concerned aspects of crisis and change in higher education and almost all, in one way or another, addressed issues of identity and consciousness in relation to knowledge formation, transition and acquisition. This is reflected in the structure of this volume where most of this Introduction is devoted to anatomising aspects of Bernstein’s analysis of the origins of the university and its continuity with contemporary shifts from disciplinarity to trainability and in Part II, ‘Shifting cargo: from singulars to regions and generic knowledge forms’, where a series of empirical studies give accounts of changing knowledge structures in university contexts in teacher education in Greece, Engineering, Physics and Anthropology in Iceland, Media Studies and Journalism in South Africa and contrasting occupational preparation in higher education (HE) and vocational education and Training (VET) in Australia. These analyses rest foursquare on fundamental questions explored by Bernstein concerning what knowledge is and how it is produced and made available which are taken up by Maton, Muller and Frandji and Vitale, the contributors to Part I, ‘Knowledge and knowers in late modernity’, each focusing upon big, theoretical issues of what is thinkable in any particular era and its relationship to individual and group subjectivities and identities. Each, indicatively, argues for the greater theoretical, empirical and problem-solving power of Bernstein’s work than that of his contemporary Bourdieu. In turn, Part III, ‘Multiply anchored subjectivities’, focuses on elaborating some recent conceptual developments about pedagogic regulation, consciousness and embodiment that celebrate both the openness of Bernstein’s work to other disciplinary approaches and its anchorage in class inscription. These are illustrated by Lapping’s exploration of his use of Kleinian notions of identity, Evans and others’ claim that modification of his notion of the ‘pedagogic device’ provides new and interesting ways of relating biology and culture and Gamble and Hoadley’s analysis of classroom pedagogic control that, like the work of Morais and her associates, reminds us that the institutionalisation and operation of personal modalities in our schools will not necessarily secure access for all children to vertical knowledge forms. The outstanding characteristics of Bernstein’s vision of pedagogic processes concern their pervasiveness, connectedness and intimacy of relation to social and cultural hierarchy, power and control. He was very fond of saying that while the differences that marked the natural and social worlds were endless sources of fascination, it was the invidious ranking of the crucial categories of class, gender, race, region and religion that underlay our need to understand ‘both the creation, management and legitimation of specialized differences and the creation, management and legitimation of various social inequalities’ through schooling and other social agencies and that this involved ‘analyzing the complex inter-relations between education, stratification, economy and the various principles and arrangements of the State’ (Bernstein, 1981: n.p.). His own view of where the script for doing so should start, ‘even where the plot is not worked out and half the characters are missing’, lay in Durkheim’s representation of the contradictory dynamic ‘of the two discourses upon which the medieval university was founded, that of Christianity and that of Greek thought’ (Bernstein, 1996: 82). In a world where universities are required to service society and demonstrate their functional use, Bernstein’s sociology allows modern anxieties about shifts in conceptions of knowledge from sacred to secular, content to skills and text to hypermedia to be placed within a long historical trajectory. His work on the origins of knowledge in ancient Greek universities and changes in the classification and framing of formal knowledge across eras places the information revolution of late modernity in context. While contemporary educational policy rhetoric calls for a radical rethinking of school and university curricula by conjuring terms such as ‘generic skills’, a historical perspective grounds such debates in issues of subjectivity, learning and the limits to the possibilities for knowing in late modernity. Asking what kind of knowledge is needed for the future raises anxieties; knowing futures is an art that we have not yet mastered (Adam and Groves, 2007). Perhaps, instead, our starting point should be rethinking the question, ‘what is education for?' Bernstein (2001: 382) points out that education is controlled and increasingly micro-managed by the state. Whereas the last time we had a totally pedagogised society in the medieval period, when the Catholic Church dominated social life, now schools, universities and other statesponsored institutions increasingly serve the needs of government and remind us not to ‘confuse opportunity with democracy’ (ibid.). Pedagogic panic has masked moral panic and new discourses of pedagogy, ignoring content and focusing only on competencies, risk its reduction to technology and learning becoming completely decontextualised from the rest of acquirers’ life spans. What Bernstein feared most of all was the ‘socially empty’, neo-liberal notion of ‘trainability’ (ibid.: 366), inscribed in ‘life long learning’ rhetoric as ‘creativity and adaptability’ (ibid.: 368), reminding us that the need for pedagogy to be meaningful as well as relevant provides one of our greatest challenges, requiring us to reintroduce issues about content and epistemology into educational debates. In times of weak global and strong pedagogic states we need to look outside formal to informal, adult or popular education ‘outside of the State [where] there’s a possibility for change and initiative’ (ibid.: 382). It is in the interest of pursuing such themes that I now turn in this Introduction to a brief elaboration of Bernstein and other’s views of pedagogic origins, before returning to outline in more detail the nature of the other contributions contained in this volume, where Muller suggests that discussions within education about epistemology have tended to be limited to scientific knowledge, suggesting that we have not yet worked out the full ramifications of Durkheim’s discussion of the Greek curriculum. The humanities constitute the modern Trivium, and can be characterised as disciplines that develop inner consciousness or sensibility. The sciences are disciplines that investigate the outer world, and analyses of the two, involving changes both in knowledge and pedagogy, have not yet been properly conjoined. Even more importantly, what appears to have been left out of current debates and analysis about the purpose of education is the role it plays in the formation of consciousness. In asking what education is for we need to consider social organisation and knowledge more adequately. Knowledge that was produced outside the university in guilds and crafts is attracting increasing attention (e.g. Sennett, 2008) and apprenticeship is being reinvented as the way forward in many education policy documents. In this analysis, early forms of community and institutionalised educational practice, such as existed in monasteries and craft workshops, will be used to explore relationships between curriculum, pedagogy and consciousness that help us to think about knowledge and knowers in late modernity. © 2011 Gabrielle Ivinson, Brian Davies and John Fitz for selection and editorial material. Individual chapters, the contributors.

While addressing the recent convocation ceremony of Yaba College of Technology, Lagos, Nigeria's Minister of education, Sam Egwu assured the millions of unemployed and poor youth lacking employability skills that technical education would enjoy more government support in 2010 because of the role of technology in national development. Previous administrations have raised their hope by painting glowing pictures of their development plans and promised that youth empowerment would become their top priority. Yet they have failed to properly fund education and to restructure the curriculum to prepare the youth for the world of work as well as to create employment for the millions of graduates churn out by the educational institutions yearly. This paper argues that without addressing the challenges facing education in general, and technical and vocational education in particular, the youth will continue to face soaring unemployment, underemployment and poverty and the nation will remain underdeveloped. © 2010 Adonis and Abbey Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.

[No abstract available]

Most youths in Germany successfully complete a qualification within the dual vocational training system. Due to the institutional settings, it builds the basis for smooth transitions from the education system to the labour market. However, over the last few years, unemployment rates amongst those who have completed an apprenticeship have increased; not everyone, however, has been affected to the same degree. Despite the formally identical education level, there are large differences between apprenticeships. It is these differences that explain the causes of unemployment. As the results in this article show, it is characteristics, during the apprenticeship period, of the firms that provide the training that influence the risk of unemployment. © 2010 Duncker und Humblot GmbH. All rights reserved.

Degrees from vocational education and training (VET) are considered to guarantee a successful transition from school to work. The German labor market is strongly segmented along occupations. Consequently chances for a successful transition into the labor market are distributed unequally. Educational certificates from general education as well as from the VET system serve as signals for expected productivity and learnability throughout work and occupation. Hence, signals determine wage expectancies of VET graduates. Better degrees in general and vocational education, as well as higher training expenditures by bigger firms eventually result in first job salary disparities. Using the Saarland VET Graduate Panel, we can for the first time analyze the impact of final grades received by VET graduates on wages in their first job. In our study VET grades represent a stable and significant additional human capital indicator in explaining wage differences among graduates within comparable occupations. © 2010 Duncker und Humblot GmbH. All rights reserved.

Tables and Figures\Acknowledgements\Notes on the Contributors\Introduction\Part I. The Global Policy Context\1. Lessons from International and Comparative education -David Bainton and Michael Crossley\2. education for All: A freedom-based approach -James Stanfield\3. Women's education in the Developing World -Máiréad Dunne\4. Self-assessment in the Further education College of a Small State -Gary Jones, Edward Sallis and Peter Hubert\5. The Contribution of European Programmes to Social Change -Simone Kirpal\Part II. Community Integration and Inclusion\6. Social Marketing -Chahid Fourali\7. Basic education Status of Afghan Refugees in Iran -Maryam Danaye Tousi and Alireza Kiamanesh\8. Respecting Difference in Early Childhood Centres in Northern Ireland -Siobhán Fitzpatrick\9. Elitism, Inclusion and the Specialist School -Carla Solvason\10. Higher education and Civic and Community Engagement in the UK -John Annette\Part III. Curriculum Reform\11. Beyond Borders: Expanding the uses of work based learning -Elda Nikolou-Walker and Lynn Fee\12. Government Policy and Teacher education in Ghana -Kwame Akyeampong\13. Transforming China's Adult and Continuing education -Ning Rong Liu\14. An 'Essential Attributes' Approach to Curriculum Reform -Francis Murphy\15. Reforming VET for Social Cohesion -George K Zarifis\Part IV. Learning and Pedagogy\16. Transformative Learning for a Global Society -Doug Bourn and Sally Issler\17. Post-colonial and Post-critical 'Global Citizenship education' -Vanessa Andreotti\18. Validation of Non-formal and Informal Learning in Europe -Manuel Souto-Otero\19. Transnational Cooperation in Learning Support for Disabled Learners -Val Chapman\20. vocational education -Erica Smith and Andy Smith\Conclusions and Implications\Selected Bibliography\Selected Resources\Index. © Geoffrey Elliott, Chahid Fourali, Sally Issler and Contributors 2010. All rights reserved.

vocational education is central to the plans of policy makers around the world; it underpins the development of the poorest economies, and the continued competitiveness of the richest. Technical and vocational education and Training debates the key issues:* How far can the same principles be applied to vocational learning in universities, colleges, schools and the workplace?* Do the needs of learners and the needs of the economy always coincide? Should teachers focus on the delivery of skills or the development of cultures?* What will determine whether what is learnt corresponds to what is taught?* Who are the stakeholders in vocational learning, and can they all be satisfied at once?* What does it really mean to say that vocational provision is a kind of investment?Drawing on contemporary, internationally-significant case studies in water education, management education and education for sustainable development along with UNESCO’s International Centre for Technical and vocational education and Training, Gough provides a challenging discussion. © Stephen Gough 2010.