How do teachers learn in a work placement programme?
Na Zhou (PhD at ICLON) researched how vocational teachers’ learning takes place in a work placement programme and how their learning supports their teaching in school. Defence on 1 March.
Work placement has been implemented nationwide in Chinese vocational education, and all vocational teachers have been required to conduct this programme for at least six months within each five-year period since 2016. However, there are several obstacles for vocational teachers, programme designers, and school leaders to engage in work placement. It seems that all these obstacles were derived from the lack of understanding of vocational teachers’ learning in this programme. Prior studies strived to probe into factors influencing vocational teachers’ participation in this programme, while these seldomly focused on vocational teachers’ learning. To get a deep insight into vocational teachers’ learning in this programme, this dissertation specifically focuses on vocational teachers’ learning process in work placement.
In this study, work placement is indicated as an important learning activity for vocational teachers. There is a significant relationship between vocational teachers’ motivational beliefs and their engagement toward work placement. Furthermore, work placement has a variety of benefits with regard to cognition, behaviour, emotion, institution, and teaching practice, which further confirms that it is an effective learning programme for vocational teachers.
In general, the results of this dissertation provide comprehensive insight into vocational teachers’ learning process in the context of work placement.
A summary is provided in English, Dutch and Chinese.