Cognition
Metacognition
Epistemic Cognition
PBL emphasises the amount of knowledge that explicitly needs to be provided for higher education students in a specific syllabus or topic and sets out a framework through which students can better relate theories to real-life problems (Lam, 2004). PBL- compared to LBL- is argued by many scholars to improve critical thinking, communication, mutual respect, teamwork and interpersonal skills and to increase students’ interest in a course (Gordon, Rogers, Comfort, Gavula & McGee 2001; McBroom & McBroom 2001; Sage 1996; Savoie & Hughes 1994; West 1992). PBL is characterized by the following features:
a. ‘Learning is student centred’;
b. ‘Real-life problems form the organizing focus and stimulus for learning’; c. ‘Problems are vehicles for the development of experiential knowledge and
problem-solving skills’ (Barrows, 1996:5);
d. Students are offered ‘opportunities to learn how to learn’ (Savin-Baden, 2000:146);
e. Students engage in self-directed learning to acquire new information under the guidance of the teacher who plays the role of the coach or facilitator rather than knowledge provider (Barrows, 1996; Hmelo-Silver, 2004);
f. Students engage in ‘active and transferable learning’; and
g. ‘Students develop flexible understanding and lifelong learning skills’ (Hmelo- Silver, 2004: 235).
PBL, in higher education, usually takes place in small tutorial groups, as opposed to conventional LBL. In PBL, students learn to become independent learners (Lam, 2004). They learn by first drawing on their previous learning and personal knowledge to analyse the presented problem, then deciding on their own learning priorities, and finally setting the means of acquiring information to resolve the problem (Lam, 2004). PBL currently enjoys worldwide agreement on being an innovative unique-featured approach in education (Boud & Feletti, 1997) and a major route for curricular integration (Drake & Burns, 2004). The extent of adoption of PBL- the whole curriculum, part thereof, or just a single subject- may be an issue of non-consensus
75 (Boud & Feletti, 1997). However, attempting to develop a collection-code curriculum which is based on high disciplinarity and isolation between subjects through a PBL approach will end up in a “disaster” (Savin-Baden & Major, 2004). Adopting PBL is not always a so obvious process as it might encounter complexities related to the nature of the discipline, the organisational culture, the structure of the curriculum, and/or students’ understandings, concerns, and needs (Savin-Baden, 2000). To be effective, PBL needs to be viewed as a curricular approach and situated in a team learning “context and culture” rather than just be offered as an occasional or an ad-hoc strategy (Savin-Baden & Major, 2004).
2.2.5.3- Practice- Based Learning
Practice-based learning is learning that takes place within the ‘practice setting’, i.e. within the workplace (Cross, Moore, Morris, Caladine, Hilton and Bristow, 2006). The practice setting is the paramount setting where procedural knowledge (Anderson, 1982) or knowing how and propositional knowledge can be acquired and reflected upon (Beckett & Hager, 2002; Billet, 2001; Cervero, 1992). These two forms of knowledge, which may not be acquired through conventional university settings, are indispensable for effective proficient practice (Beckett & Hager, 2002; Billet, 2001; Cervero, 1992).
Knowing how within practice is referred to as tacit knowledge (Brown & Duguid, 2001). Tacit knowledge is silent knowledge (Sapienza, 2002) grounded in experience (Horvath et al., 1999) and may be cultivated, acquired, and expressed through practice (Nestor-Baker & Hoy, 2001). It is the knowledge which cannot be easily put into words and comprises all the practical knowledge, practical competencies, and craft secrets of a given field (Beckett & Hager, 2002). Tacit knowledge consists of embodied expertise: ‘a deep understanding of complex interdependent systems that enables dynamic responses to context-specific problems (Wenger, McDermott & Snyder, 2002: 9). Tacit knowledge is argued to be equally important as explicit knowledge within the knowledge dichotomy (Brown & Duguid, 2001; Polanyi, 1966). Practitioners at different levels of a hierarchy of expertise possess different tacit
knowledge competences (Doak & Assimakopoulus, 2006). It has been found that the ‘difference between experts and novices is related to their inventory of tacit knowledge’ (Sternberg, 2000:122). Tacit knowledge is vital for the development of professional practice and can be a source of highly effective performance in the workplace (Sternberg & Horvath, 1999).
Tacit knowledge is ‘embedded in holistic work process, is implicitly gained, and is an integral part in the accomplishment of working tasks’ (Herbig, Bussing & Ewert, 2001:690). Hence, such knowledge is much more likely to be emphasised and cultivated through the implicit informal practice-based learning settings, such as workplace learning setting, rather than explicit formal learning settings, such as classroom setting (Beckett & Hager, 2002).
Practice-based learning has long existed but was left disregarded, until recently because of the dominance of the ‘standard paradigm of learning’ which catered only for formal learning settings (Beckett & Hager, 2002). Until the second half of the twentieth century, the assumptions that ‘work is what follows from formal learning experiences and the most valuable learning is the standard paradigm of learning’ have governed educational thought (Beckett & Hager, 2002:98). This assumption had long survived through the traditional focus of Western education on ‘Platonic epistemology and on Cartesian ontology, both of which emphasise theory over practice’ (Beckett & Hager, 2002: 52). Thus other forms of learning, including practice-based learning, have been appraised by how well they approximate to the standard paradigm of learning. The differences between formal learning activities of all kinds and practice-based informal learning are detailed in Table-2c (Beckett & Hager, 2002:128).
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Formal Learning Informal Practice-Based Learning
Single capacity focus, e.g. cognition Organic/holistic
Decontextualised Contextualised
Passive spectator Activity- and experienced-based An end in itself Dependent on other activities Stimulated by teachers/trainers Activated by individual learners Individualistic Often collaborative/collegial
Table- 2c
The features of informal practice-based learning have contributed in the emergence of formal work-based learning degrees which initiated discussions amongst higher education theorists to make sense of work as a curriculum (Boud & Solomon, 2001). Practice-based learning currently plays an imperative and indispensable role within higher education (Beckett & Hager, 2002; Billet, 2001; Lam, 2004). Practice-based learning may exist in various forms, the two major of which are field practicum and workplace learning.
2.2.5.3.1- Field Practicum
Field practicum is one form of practice-based learning (Cross et al., 2006) which takes place within higher education as either a part of foundation degree programs (Foskett, 2003), or of bachelor/ honours programs which involve a placement year or equivalent within their curriculum (Anema & McCoy, 2009). Field practicum often requires students to finish some core theoretical studies at their education institutions before they are referred to an agency or workplace relevant to their course of study (Lam, 2004).
Foundation degrees are new two-year qualifications (HEFCE26
26 HEFCE= Higher Education Funding Council for England
, 2000a) which combine both ‘academic’ and ‘vocational’ learning (HEFCE, 2000b). These newly introduced qualifications first emerged in the U.K. (HEFCE, 2000a) in response to governments’ policy of engaging the higher education sector to collaborate closely with businesses in order to: 1) assist workforce advancement, and development (Foskett, 2003), 2) meet
employers’ needs (HEFCE, 2000a), and 3) make up for the shortage in the number of employees operating as senior technicians and associate professionals (DFES27, 2003). Work placements have become an essential complementary component in many higher education courses all over the world (Bullock, Gould, Hejmadi, & Lock, 2009). Work placements prepare tertiary education students to function in the workplace and become job-ready upon graduation by meeting relevant industry and accreditation requirements (Anema & McCoy, 2009). The significance of work placements within higher education courses emerges from the significance of “learning by doing” in developing students’ professional knowledge and competencies essential for their future professions (Chesser-Smyth, 2005; Skinner & Whyte, 2004). Through their placements, students: a) acquire generic skills, b) are exposed to related real-life contexts, where they integrate theoretical knowledge with practice, c) are equipped with practical experience explicit to their workplace, and 4) enrich their curriculum vitae and hence improve their chances of employability upon graduation (Cross et al., 2006; Skinner & Whyte, 2004; Kissman & Van Tran, 1990; Vayda & Bogo, 1991). Examples of higher education courses which incorporate work placements within their curriculum include:
Teaching qualifications, where placements often occur as part of school- university partnerships (Slater, 2010; Tsui, 2008),
Nursing education, where placements often occur as part of partnerships between universities and relevant healthcare organisations (Lambert & Glacken, 2005), and
Social care education, where placements often occur as part of formal links between universities and social care agencies (Skinner & Whyte, 2004).
Partnerships are considered to be at the core of work-based learning, and partnership as a notion operates in a variety of ways (Savin-Baden, 2003):
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The first form of partnership exists between higher education institutions and the funders of work-based learning, and
The second form of partnership occurs between the university and the learner. Whilst the learner remains the ‘main stakeholder in a tripartite partnership’ between university, employer, and student, s/he is left to ‘manage the complexity of being perceived by the university as a learner and by the employer as an employee’ (Savin- Baden, 2003:17).
2.2.5.3.2- Workplace Learning
Workplace learning is simply ‘learning through work’ (Reeve & Gallacher, 1999:1). It is an ‘informal setting’ allowing optimum practical exposure and ‘acquisition of robust and transferable skills’ (Billett, 1993:4). Learning and working are ‘interdependent’:
Learning and working are interdependent. We learn constantly through engaging in conscious goal-directed everyday activities- indeed, as we think and act, we learn Billet (2001:21).
Learning through observation or mentoring is a social process of learning emphasised within workplace learning settings (Tsui, 2008). Observational learning is ‘learning that occurs as a function of observing, retaining, and... replicating novel behaviour executed by others’ (Western, Burton, & Kowalski, 2006:4). Wayne Weiten (2008) argues that there are four key processes of observational learning: attention, retention, reproduction, and motivation. Learning through observation starts with paying attention to another person’s behaviour and its consequences, moves to storing a mental representation of what had been observed, and concludes with reproducing the stored mental images into overt behaviour. All of these three steps are unlikely to successfully take place without motivation (Weiten, 2008). Mentoring in the workplace contributes in the formation of an identity of belonging to the related community of practice through the social interaction between the novice practitioners (mentees) and the more experienced practitioners (mentors) (Tsui,2008).
Workplace learning rests on the foundations of ‘learning as participation’ (Billet, 2001; Eraut, 2000; Fuller & Unwin, 2003) which challenge conventional ways of viewing ‘learning as acquisition’ (Beckett & Hager, 2002). Workplace learning takes ‘experience as the starting point for learning’ and has the potential to erode traditional boundaries: between knowledge and skills, between vocational and academic learning, and within disciplines themselves (Reeve & Gallacher, 1999:4).
The assumption that learning outside the framework of conventional education models is inferior, weak and concrete has stereotyped workplace learning for long (Billet, 2001). In reality, workplace learning has long existed before vocational colleges and universities had been established. Craft workers has long been applying their vocational knowledge in various fields such as building (castles, mansions, temples, etc) and manufacturing (soap, coal, cloths, etc) (Keller & Keller 1993; Whalley & Barley 1997), and transferring such knowledge across the generations (Billet, 2001). Moreover, many students experience difficulties and frustrations when attempting to apply acquired knowledge to workplace tasks (Raizen, 1994). This transferability problem can be attributed to the belief that knowledge acquired within a university context may not harmonize with knowledge required to solve specific tasks within a workplace context (Billet, 2001). Hence one of the aims of workplace learning is to ‘vocationalise’ higher education, attempting to minimise the problem of knowledge transferability (Reeve & Gallacher, 1999).
Workplace learning relocates learning from the education institution to the workplace and by doing so it not only emphasises experiential knowledge, but also emphasises theoretical knowledge (Walker & Dewar, 1997). Theoretical knowledge underpins practical application, although practitioners are often ‘unaware of the nature or extent of their learning’ (Beckett & Hager, 2002:119). They might come across theoretical knowledge, but they might not recognise it, because their learning is informal and implicit in contrast to the explicitness of formal education (Beckett & Hager, 2002).
81 The importance of informal learning in workplaces is not meant to override that of formal learning in education institutions (Billet, 2001). It is the ‘well supported mixtures of formal and informal learning’ which contribute to the development of proficient and productive practitioners (Beckett & Hager, 2002: 191).
Workplace learning is often ‘informal’; however, there exists a formal format of learning in the workplace, often referred to as ‘work-based learning’ (Beckett and Hager, 2002). In work-based learning, employees, often sponsored by their employers, commence/continue studying in a work-related field of knowledge under the joint supervision of representatives from both the student’s employer and education institution (Walker & Dewar, 1997). In this format of learning, the student’s work becomes the main basis of the curriculum (Boud & Solomon 2001).
In summary, workplace learning is an ‘organic’ form of learning which acknowledges lifelong learning (Beckett & Hager, 2002). It also offers experiences which are explicit to the workplace context: experiences which are non-replicable within academic contexts (Billet, 2001). Through workplace learning, practitioners learn how to apply various forms of knowledge and competencies in harmony with one another, and learn how to ‘put it all together’, in order to achieve proficient practice in their occupations (Beckett & Hager, 2002). The contributions of the workplace to learning are neither ‘incidental’ nor ‘ad hoc’; in contrast, they are ‘rich, complex and probably difficult to avoid’ (Billet, 2001:39). However, despite all the prominence it has gained, workplace learning initiatives have been, and continue to be, ‘topics without a settled home’ (Beckett & Hager, 2002:100).
2.2.6- Decision-Making about Curricular and Pedagogical Approaches from a Social Science Perspective
The two previous subsections (2.2.4 and 2.2.5) examined the different curricular approaches and pedagogical strategies that may be adopted in the education of a tertiary program/course. This subsection examines decision making about the curricular approach and pedagogical strategy to be adopted in a field of study: what to
include/ what to not include in a curriculum, how to organise content, and how to deliver such content. Decision making about curriculum and pedagogy is examined through Bernstein’s perspective: the notion of social power and control.
In volume 3 of his book “Class, Codes, and Control: Towards a Theory of Educational Transmissions” Bernstein introduced two terms: ‘classification’ and ‘framing’ (1977). According to Bernstein, classification refers to ‘the degree of boundary maintenance between contents’ in a curriculum, and framing refers to ‘the form of the context in which knowledge is transmitted and received’ (p.88). He then argued that decisions on the curriculum, pedagogy, and evaluation of any discipline are decisions on the classification and framing of the educational knowledge code relating to that discipline. These decisions reflect both the ‘distribution of power and the principles of social control’ (p. 85). In his more recent publication: “Pedagogy, Symbolic Control and Identity”, Bernstein re-explores his notion by arguing that the manner through which the code of a certain discipline is classified and framed reflects and translates the interests of the social groups that are the stakeholders of such a discipline (2000). Power relations ‘create, legitimatise, or reproduce boundaries between different categories of discourses’ (Bernstein, 2000:12). In this respect, Bernstein (2000) gives the example of the categories of discourse in a secondary school or university, where the classification and the framing between these discourse categories are a reflection of the social division which exists between labour of discourse:
We have shown how power relations translate into principles of strong and weak classifications and how these principles establish social divisions of labour, how these principles establish identities, how these principles establish voices (p.12). Bernstein argues that the classification and framing of content contribute to each discourse category developing its unique identity, an ‘identity with its own internal rules and special voice’ (2000:6). However, in cases of weak classification, categories have less specialised voices and are in danger of losing their identities (Bernstein, 2000). Bernstein argues that the emergence of new fields of knowledge comes as a
83 consequence of weak classification in more conventional fields of knowledge. For example, ‘regionalised’ fields of knowledge (e.g. information system, biochemistry, biophysics, etc) emerge as a result of weak classification of the more centralised fields of knowledge (e.g. maths, physics, chemistry, biology, etc) (2000:9). In this respect, forensic science may be perceived as one of these regionalised fields of knowledge which is striving to emerge as a stand-alone field of knowledge amongst the more centralised fields of knowledge which comprise it.
Based on his theory of power, control, and social groups, Bernstein inquired into the existence of any general principles which underlie the ‘transformation of knowledge into pedagogic communication’ (2000:25). The result of his inquiry was the emergence of the notion of the “pedagogic device” (Bernstein, 2000; Singh, 2002). The pedagogic device operates in accordance with certain rules which are hierarchically interrelated (Singh, 2002). These rules are (Bernstein, 2000: 28-37):
Distributive Rules: regulate the relationships between power, social groups, forms of consciousness, and practice in terms of who may transmit what to whom and under what conditions. This is the phase of knowledge production.
Recontexualising Rules (Pedagogic Discourse): embed two discourses:
instructional discourse (discourse of curricular content) and regulative discourse (discourse of social order which regulates order, relation, and identity). The instructional discourse is embedded in the regulative discourse, where the regulative discourse is the dominant one. Pedagogic discourse is the phase of knowledge recontexualising.
Evaluative Rules: constitute specific pedagogic practices by recognising what count as valid realisations of instructional texts and regulative texts. This is the phase of knowledge acquisition.
Through Bernstein’s pedagogic device specialised knowledge is recontexualised and reconceptualised where it is transformed from its original site to a new site where it is
related to other discourses and then acquired (Singh, 2002). Bernstein’s pedagogic device provides researchers and educators with ‘explicit criteria/rules to describe the macro and micro structuring of knowledge and in particular the generative relations of power and control constituting knowledge’ (Singh, 2002:571). Bernstein’s pedagogic device will be adopted by the research to promote discourse amongst identified conceptions.
2.2.7- The role of Higher Education in Promoting Discipline-Specific Skills, Generic Skills, and Graduate Attributes.
Higher education courses need to emphasise discipline-specific skills, generic skills, and graduate attributes (Barrie, 2005; Fallows & Steven, 2000). The discipline-specific skills refer to the knowledge and skills which are pertinent to conduct and complete activities and tasks related to a particular occupation/profession (Barrie, 2005). Generic skills are general capabilities which are transferable and useful in any work situation (e.g. teamwork, communication skills, planning and organising, problem solving skills, critical thinking, and life-long learning (Bowden & Marton, 1998). Graduate attributes have been described by Bowden, Hart, King, Trigwell and Watts as:
The qualities, skills, and understandings a university community agrees its students should develop during their time with the institution. These attributes include but go beyond the disciplinary expertise or technical knowledge that has traditionally formed the core of most university courses. They are qualities that also prepare graduates as agents of social good in an unknown future (2000:3). Out of the range of generic skills which are expected to be acquired by graduates of higher education courses, the literature focuses mainly on critical thinking, communications skills, and problem solving skills which might be of more significance to the forensic science profession.
Critical thinking comprises one of the important generic skills- if not the most important at all- for a number of disciplines and professions (Assister, 1995; Beyer,
85 1987). The definition of critical thinking is usually approached in terms of a skill component and an attitude component (Garside, 1996). Critical thinking is defined as