Professional Pedagogy

Professional pedagogy encompasses the science, art, and craft of teaching and learning in vocational education. In fact, professional pedagogy is the collection of many decisions that professional teachers make while teaching, adapting their approaches to meet the needs of learners and to fit the context in which they find themselves.

Once we better understand professional pedagogy, it allows us to develop models and tools that can help teachers more effectively match teaching and learning methods with the needs of their students and the context in which they work.

In principle, a description or theoretical foundation cannot be developed for professional pedagogy if we are not willing to ask and answer some fundamental questions about vocational education.

Five key steps in the development of professional pedagogy

• Clarify the purpose of vocational education.
• Thoroughly understand the nature of your subject.
• Define the scope of desired learning outcomes.
• Select teaching and learning methods that can provide the best combination.
• Consider all contextual factors: the nature of the learners; the teacher’s skills and learning settings.

However, we must make a clarification of the word “subject.” Learning how to build a load-bearing wall is different from cutting hair, creating a website, or caring for someone with dementia. Helping people learn how to do these very different things requires very different approaches to professional pedagogy. Similarly, effective vocational teachers develop a long list of teaching and learning methods, choosing those that are likely to work best in a given situation. They adapt to the needs of the learners and the context in which the learning takes place.