Certifying Navigational Skills: A Video-based Study on Assessments in Simulated Environments

In Maritime Education and Training (MET) where students are trained for professions with high standards of safety, the use of simulators is taken to provide opportunities for safe and cost-effective training. Although the use of simulators for training and certifying technical proficiency and so-called non-technical skills is well established and regulated by international standards, previous research suggests that simulator-based assessment has been poorly implemented in the MET system. Now the challenge is to contribute with knowledge about how to conduct consistent, unbiased, and transparent assessments of navigational skills and competencies. However, in current research it is not evident how training of non-technical skills in simulated environments should be assessed. The aim of this study is to explore the pedagogical challenges instructors face when assessing students\u27 navigational skills and competencies in a simulated environment. The study is based on video-recorded data from the certification part in a navigation course for second year master mariner students. A situated approach to cognition and learning is employed to analyze the co-construction of assessment in the simulated exercises by means of instructors\u27 questions and students\u27 answers. Results reveal an assessment practice where the students are still developing their navigational skills with instructional support from examiners whilst being certified on using Radar equipment in accordance to COLREG

Learning to navigate: the centrality of instructions and assessments for developing students\u27 professional competencies in simulator-based training

Despite the promises of simulations to contribute to learning in safe-critical domains, research suggests that simulators are poorly implemented in maritime education and training systems. From the current state of research, it is far from evident how instruction in simulator-based should be designed and how skills trained in bridge simulators should be assessed and connected to professional practice. On this background, this article aims to investigate the role of instructions and assessments for developing students\u27 professional competencies in simulation-based learning environments. The research draws on ethnographic fieldwork and detailed analyses of video-recorded data to examine how maritime instructors make use of simulator technologies in a navigation course. Our results reveal an instructional practice in which the need to account for general principles of good seamanship and anti-collision regulations is at the core of basic navigation training. The meanings of good seamanship and the rules of the sea are hard to teach in abstraction because their application relies on an infinite number of contingencies that have to be accounted for in every specific case. Based on this premise, we stress the importance of instructional support throughout training (from briefing thorough scenario to debriefing) in order for the instructor to bridge theory and practice in ways that develop students\u27 competencies. Our results highlight, in detail, how simulator technologies enable displaying and assessing such competencies by supporting instructors to continuously monitor, assess, and provide feedback to the students during training sessions. Moreover, our results show how simulator-based training is related to the work conditions on board a seagoing vessel through the instructor\u27s systematic accomplishments. Finally, our results highlight the close relationship between technical and non-technical skills in navigation, and how these are intertwined in training for everyday maritime operations

The Church of Sweden and the Sami - a White Paper Project : Background, Assignment, Organisation and Results

Svenska kyrkan och samerna - ett vitboksprojek

Training skills and assessing performance in simulator-based learning environments

This article reports the results from a research project on the use of simulator technologies in the training and assessment of professional performance in maritime training. The research draws on ethnographic fieldwork and analyses of video-recorded data to examine how maritime instructors make use of simulator technologies during instruction. Our results reveal an instructional practice where the need to account for general principles of good seamanship and international regulations is at the core of the basic maritime training. The meanings of good seamanship and the rules of the sea are hard to teach in abstraction, since their application relies on an infinite number of contingencies that have to be accounted for in every specific case. Based on this premise, we are stressing the importance of both inscenario instruction and post-simulation debriefing in order for the instructor to bridge theory and practice in ways that develop the students\u27 professional competences. Moreover, our results highlight how simulator technologies enable unique ways of displaying and assessing such competences by enabling instructors to continuously monitor, assess and provide feedback to the students throughout training sessions. Our results imply that training models advocating isolating and targeting technical and non-technical skills during training conflict with training for rule-governed maritime operations where such skills are intricately entwined. Furthermore, our results show that debriefing models that recommend a linear chronological order of discrete phases could be misleading. Although this structure might provide an overall resource, processes of connecting principles and rules to a multitude of specific circumstances in the training scenarios are at play throughout the debriefings

Michel VIVANT et Jean-Michel BRUGUIÈRE, Droit d'auteur

International audiencePrécis Dalloz, 1re éd., 2009, 814 page