The research project examines how Working Life Skills is organised and enacted in practice in lower secondary schools in the municipalities of Trondheim and Malvik, and how the subject is experienced by students, teachers and school leaders.

Working Life Skills is intended to provide students with experience of practical and vocationally oriented tasks and to help them develop knowledge and skills that are relevant to further education and working life. The subject therefore has a central role in efforts to make lower secondary education more practical, varied and relevant. At the same time, we still know too little about the learning opportunities students are actually given, how the intentions of the curriculum are translated into practice, and which pedagogical, material and organisational conditions promote or constrain the quality of the subject.

The project pays particular attention to how students, teachers and school leaders understand practical and vocationally oriented learning, how work assignments are planned and carried out, and how facilities, equipment, teacher competence, organisation and collaboration with external partners shape the learning opportunities provided. It also examines the potential significance of the subject for students’ sense of mastery, motivation and well-being, as well as for their exploration of future educational and career choices.

A key question is what is required for practical activities to become meaningful learning experiences. It is not necessarily sufficient for students simply to engage in practical work or produce an artefact. Learning opportunities also depend on whether assignments are connected to genuine needs and recipients, and whether they provide students with insight into, or opportunities to participate in, vocationally relevant communities of practice associated with upper secondary education and working life.

It is also important whether students are able to contribute to planning and decision-making, test their own solutions, and use relevant materials, tools, equipment and technologies in collaboration with peers, teachers, vocational teachers and professionals from different occupational fields.

How Do We Study Working Life Skills?

The project adopts an interpretive and exploratory approach, with a primary emphasis on qualitative methods. Data collection is planned to include individual semi-structured interviews with teachers and school leaders, focus group interviews with students, and observations during network meetings for Working Life Skills. Surveys may also be conducted, and local curriculum plans, work assignments and assessment practices may be analysed.

During the network meetings, teachers, school leaders and researchers share experiences and discuss challenges and opportunities for the further development of the subject. The researchers will adopt a primarily non-participant observer role. The observations will be documented through systematic fieldnotes and a reflexive research log.

The network includes schools with different organisational models and contextual conditions. Data collected during the network meetings may therefore help illuminate both common features and local variations in how Working Life Skills is organised, enacted in practice and experienced.

What Will the Project Contribute?

The project will develop a research-based foundation for the further development of Working Life Skills. The study will provide knowledge about:

• what practical and vocationally oriented learning may involve in Working Life Skills
• how the intentions of the curriculum are translated into local work assignments and learning processes
• which pedagogical, material and organisational conditions promote or constrain students’ learning and participation
• how students experience the relevance of the subject to further education and working life
• how collaboration between lower secondary schools, upper secondary education, local communities and working life can be organised
• how Working Life Skills can be strengthened as a visible, relevant and fully recognised subject in lower secondary education

The findings will be compiled in a report containing research-based recommendations for teachers, school leaders, school owners and teacher education institutions. The report will provide a knowledge base for strengthening the quality of the subject, its framework conditions and its position in lower secondary education.

The overall aim is to develop knowledge about how Working Life Skills can provide students with meaningful experiences of practical learning, education and working life, and how these experiences can better prepare them to make future educational and career choices. At the same time, the project will contribute knowledge that can support the development of a more practical lower secondary school.

Institutional Affiliation and Collaboration

The project is a research initiative at NTNU’s Department of Teacher Education. It is being developed in collaboration with the Working Life Skills network in the municipalities of Trondheim and Malvik through the grant scheme for a comprehensive system for competence and career development (SKK).
The collaboration will facilitate dialogue and knowledge exchange between researchers, teachers, school leaders and school owners.
 

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