Personal Quarterly 3/2021

9 03 / 21 PERSONALquarterly about effective workplace performance is richly contextual and well remembered and recalled, experts talking aloud as they address problems to discuss potential solutions provide access to knowledge that is unlikely to be secured through individual discovery alone. Then, access to examples of work to be under- taken, finished products, half finished products provide access to the kind of goals that learners need to secure. Moreover, some activities are pedagogically-rich on their own terms. Activities enacted when a project, issue or problem is being addressed in which discussions occur about what the issue is, perspectives on how it might be addressed and also the discussions that evaluate the various options and then the basis of decision- making are all extremely powerful learning experiences, and in different ways for workers of different levels of readiness. For instance, nurses handovers at the end of each nursing shift when the patients’ cases are discussed as are their treatments, progress and prognosis. For the novice nurse or student these provide rich insights. For the more experienced nurse these pro- vide opportunities to consider other perspectives, evaluate what is being proposed and then assist in their monitoring of the effectiveness of what has been proposed. Curiously, the close guidance of an expert or experienced worker is not necessarily featured strongly in anthropological and historical literature. However, where this does occur it is in circumstances in which, again, the worker might not be able to secure the knowledge wi- thout direct guidance and assistance. That kind of support is es- sential for developing specific procedural skills by making them accessible through heuristics or tricks of the trade and that can achieve intended outcomes. For conceptual knowledge, devices used by experts such as mnemonics (i. e. ways to remember and recall things) are helpful, particularly for individuals learning the occupational practice. Importantly, these pedagogic prac- tices are distinct from those used in schooling. Moreover, the locus of thinking and acting is that being undertaken by the learner-worker, not the experienced co-worker. (3) This then leads to the third key contribution – the per- sonal epistemologies of learners. The potential for learning, utilisation of the experiences provided and their augmented through practice pedagogies are ultimately mediated by how individual workers come to engage with them. So, individuals‘ personal epistemologies – what they know, can do and value and how they exercise that knowledge intentionally and in directed ways is central to the effectiveness of workplace lear- ning. Perhaps the most common process used to learn occu- pational capacities across human history is mimetic learning: observation, imitation and practice. Observation is an active process of seeking meaning and understanding and engaging in mental rehearsal. Similarly, imitation goes beyond mind- less copying and is an active process of seeking to reproduce something encountered and needing to be exercised by the in- dividual. Practice is required to develop, enhance and hone pro- cedural capacities, to develop deep conceptual understanding and exercise dispositions. All of this is vested in individuals as active and engaged learners. However, this process should not be seen as being a highly individualised cognitive process as in self-directed learning, but one mediated by the individual acting in particular situations in pursuance of specific goals, which may or may not be shared with what the workplace wants to achieve. It also extends to how workers come to en- gage with others from within their occupational practice and other occupational practices and the everyday interaction with more experienced and less experienced co-workers. Processes of working together (i. e. collaborations) lead to the develop- ment of shared understandings or intersubjectivity which are so central to the effective enactment of work activities, whether referring to caring for the aged, tending to patients, offering an education program, constructing a building, flying a plane or engaging in law enforcement. So, active engagement in lear- ning extends to interdependence upon and with the workers. So, from the work I have undertaken over the last 30 years, it is these three elements that stand out as being key bases for both understanding workplaces as learning environments and making them more effective both for individuals and the work- places/work practice. That is realising not only individuals’ learning and development, but also sustaining the viability of the enterprises in which they work. „There seems to be three key bases for fostering effective learning through work: (1) the practice curriculum, (2) practice pedagogies and (3) learners personal epistemologies.“ Prof. Dr. Stephen Billett