Faculty of Education - Theses
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ItemLearning work : an ethnography of work and learning in radiation therapy( 2003)That people learn at work seems to be a common sense view, but little is known about how professional identities and knowledge are shaped through and influenced by work. This study is an account of situated learning within the profession of radiation therapists. The study analyses tacit processes and informal practices of workplace learning, towards understanding the role of informal learning within the workplace and the profession. Ethnography and symbolic interactionist approaches and sociocultural perspectives are employed to explore the relational view of communities of practice and in the detail of day-to-day work. This case study highlights the importance of learning embedded in the routines of work practice. It also discusses the idea of cultivating learning through attention to the social context of the workplace and through an acknowledgment and understanding of the full nature of work and learning which occurs within the profession of radiation therapists.
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ItemOut of the frying pan : to what extent does Certificate III in hospitality (Commercial Cookery) prepare students for further education?( 2009)Further education, a subset of lifelong learning occurring post-compulsory schooling, is an educational and economic requirement to re-skill the workforce for current rapid technological changes requiring broadly-focused skills sets. Further education for cooks generally occurs at an Institute of Technological and Further Education (TAFE). The marketing of most TAFEs state they offer improved vocational and further educational pathways. A cook's career is often characterised by a lack of planning, transience, impulsiveness and chance. Professional cooks focus on attaining a set of culinary craft-specific skills which have limited applicability to other careers, whilst often missing opportunities to learn skills of a broader focus. Many cooks have poor experiences of formal education, both in compulsory schooling and at TAFE. Most cooks tend to career change with less than ten years experience of professional kitchens. Changing career increasingly requires pre-training from a formal education provider, however previous poor experiences of formal education inhibits this re-engagement for many cooks. The research explored the perceptions of twenty-four Commercial Cookery students (fifteen male and nine female) and their four (three male and one female) chef-trainers from a metropolitan TAFE (seventeen respondents) and a rural TAFE (eleven respondents) about the extent to which Certificate III in Hospitality (Commercial Cookery) is preparation for further education. The research explored how experiences Of TAFE and professional kitchens impacted on later re-engagement with further education. To achieve this, the research sought the opinions of apprentices through focus groups and chef-trainers through semi-structured interviews. The findings of this study indicate a need to review, anticipate, promote and prepare for the nexus between professional cooking and career change. Further, this study highlights the dominance of the paper-based assessment paradigm, and finds that this is a major obstacle to accessing much further education for kinaesthetic learners. This study should assist curriculum development through recommending scaffolding for later re-engagement with further education within Commercial Cookery study with a view to giving students a better chance to take control of their long-term future.