23,663 research outputs found
Professional Learning for Self-Management Support: the Problem of Generic Skills Development
Supporting people to self-manage long-term conditions, such as diabetes and heart disease, is a concern for health-care providers globally. Despite continued attention being paid to the production of educational resources for workforce development nationally and internationally, reports have highlighted that we do not yet know how to best help health-care professionals learn to undertake this work. This article employs sociomaterial workplace learning perspectives to show that many educational resources focus unhelpfully on generic skills and give insufficient consideration to the complicated and complex nature of this work. Using data from a wider study, which explored how health-care professionals in the United Kingdom learn to support children and their parents to self-manage type 1 diabetes, this article examines the informal learning that unfolds in the actions and conversations at work as professionals encounter, consider, explore and (temporarily) resolve specific challenges. This article provides novel insights into this area and suggests alternative ways of understanding, investigating and enabling professional knowledge
Stimulating the innovation potential of 'routine' workers through workplace learning
Governments worldwide seek to upgrade the âbasic skills' of employees deemed to have low literacy and numeracy, in order to enable their greater productivity and participation in workplace practices. A longitudinal investigation of such interventions in the United Kingdom has examined the effects on employees and on organizations of engaging in basic skills programmes offered in and through the workplace. âTrackingâ of employees in selected organizational contexts has highlighted ways in which interplay between formal and informal workplace learning can help to create the environments for employees in lower grade jobs to use and expand their skills. This workplace learning is a precondition, a stimulus and an essential ingredient for participation in employee-driven innovation, as workers engage with others to vary, and eventually to change, work practices. Š 2010, SAGE Publications. All rights reserved
The Relationship Development and Learning Organization Dimensions.
This research examined the relationship among learning organization dimensions, leadership development, employee development, and their interactions with two demographic variables (gender and ethnicity) in the context of libraries. The researchers conducted a multivariate analysis of the variance to assess the differences by leadership training groups (low training hours vs. high training hours), or by gender; and by workplace training groups (low vs. high), or by ethnicity (white vs. all others) on a linear combination of the seven dimensions of the learning organization. A conclusive summary is provided along with contributive discussion. Implications and contributions to librarians are discussed in addition to future research recommendations. Also included are conclusive final thoughts accompanied by the limitations of this research
Conflicting values in reflection on professional practice
Purpose â The purpose of this paper is to examine the use of reflection as a tool of enquiry within the context of higher education work based learning. The aim of the study is to investigate how reflection on professional practice brings about a review of the values underpinning that practice.
Design/methodology/approach â The data were collected from a group of undergraduate students
undertaking their studies by work based learning in the area of management in a Scottish University.
An open-ended questionnaire was designed to learn about the participantsâ views on their perceived
freedom to reflect on their workplace practice in the university, their ability to challenge the
organizational values and established practices in the workplace, and on their relationship with the
workplace mentor.
Findings â Students on work based learning programmes are subjected to demands from at least
three directions: first, their own expectations, in terms of both what they want to achieve by way of
their own development, second, the needs of their organization; and third, expectations of the
university in ensuring that the work produced meets the standard for an academic award. These
interests can sometimes coincide, but they can also conflict, and such a conflict can reveal tensions that run deeper into the culture of the organization.
Research limitations/implications â This study is based on a relatively small sample of learners
in one university, hence the findings are of preliminary nature. Despite the small sample size, the
conclusions are indicative of a potential problem in the design of work based learning, and a larger
cross-institutional study would allow the validity of these results to be verified.
Practical implications â The findings emerging from this study have implications for the
facilitators of work based learning in higher education. Although university work based learning
programmes differ significantly from corporate learning and development efforts, this paper suggests that work based learning providers should co-operate more closely with the learnersâ employing organizations towards creating an environment for learning at work. More co-operation between the university and the employer might be more beneficial for all stakeholders.
Originality/value â The literature on work based learning focuses in the main on the use of reflection as a tool of enquiry into workplace practice. Drawing on the study of contemporary work
organizations, this paper explores the tensions arising from reflection on the learnersâ practice, and
possible conflict of values that reflection exposes.
Keywords Professional practice, Reflection, Work based learning, Organizational practices,
Corporate learning, HE management programmes, Employees, Personal and professional development
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A Review of Work Based Learning in Higher Education
The idea of work based learning in higher education might sound like a contradiction in terms. Work based learning is surely in the the workplace. The senses in which it might also, under certain conditions, be in higher education are explored in this review. There are increasing arrangements whereby people can obtain academic recognition for learning which has taken place outside of educational institutions. In addition to traditional forms of professional education and sandwich courses, one can add a host of relationships between employers and higher education institutions which involve quite fundamental questioning of the roles and responsibilities of each in the continuing education and training of adults. Such developments can be related to broader themes concerning the organisation of knowledge in society, the changing nature of work and career, the learning society and the implications they hold for individual workers, their employers and educational providers.
The Department for Education and Employment sponsored the study to produce a substantial literature review of progress and issues raised in the field of work based learning in higher education. The first part of the book provides a contextual and conceptual backdrop against which more practical aspects of work based learning are then considered in part two. The final part considers strategic issues of implementation for higher education institutions, employers and individuals, before turning to more wide ranging issues of policy
A study of learnersâ situational vulnerability : new teachers in Scotland
Peer reviewedPublisher PD
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