The in‐between: exposing everyday learning at work

Much has been written about how space and time are integral to understanding social relations, in particular about associations between space and understanding learning in workplaces. Drawing from a research study exploring everyday learning at work, this paper looks beyond what is generally understood as work situations by turning to those spaces and times where ‘social’ and ‘work’ overlap, such as breaks in tearooms. These spaces are not so work orientated that they can be described as ‘workspaces’, nor are they entirely social. The nexus between work and the social, of being a worker and a social being, of engaging in legitimate work and socializing are put forward as rich expanses for everyday learning. The paper draws on interviews and observational data from four work sites within one organization. It undertakes an exploration of the intersection of space, time and informal learning with regard to the social/work spaces located at work. It argues that a key location for everyday learning at work is at the points of intersection between work and social spaces and that it is necessary to abandon simplistic dichotomies between work, social and learning space.

Productive reflection at work: Learning for changing organizations

This book is an accessible entry point into the theory and practice of work reflection for students and practitioners. Taking a cross-disciplinary approach, it covers management, education, organizational psychology and sociology, drawing on examples from Europe, the Middle East, North America and Australia. It traces reflection at work from an emphasis on training, through a focus on how organizations learn, to a concern with the necessary learning groups to operate effectively. It emphasizes productivity combined with satisfying lived experience of work life and points the way to a new collective focus on learning at work. © 2006 David Boud, Peter Cressey and Peter Docherty. All rights reserved.

Learning from others at work: communities of practice and informal learning

This paper addresses the question of who is involved in learning in workplaces and the ways in which members of workgroups learn as part of their normal work. It draws on qualitative data from a study of multiple worksites with differentiated work within a large organisation. It examines the value of the notion of communities of practice in conceptualising such workplace learning and suggests that other forms of conceptualisation are also needed.

Towards an emergent view of learning work

The purpose of this paper is to challenge models of workplace learning that seek to isolate or manipulate a limited set of features to increase the probability of learning. Such models typically attribute learning (or its absence) to individual engagement, manager expectations or organizational affordances and are therefore at least implicitly causative. In contrast, we discuss the contributions of complexity theory principles such as emergence and novelty that suggest that learning work is more a creative and opportunistic process that emerges from contextualized interactional understandings among actors. Using qualitative case study methods, we discuss the experiences of workers in two organizations asked to ‘act up’ in their managers’ role to ensure work continuity. We believe the differences in how workers take up these opportunities result from a complex combination of situational factors that generate invitational patterns signalled from and by various understandings and interactions among actors doing collective work. Rather than a deficit view of learning that needs fixing, an emergent model of learning work suggests that learning develops as a collective generative endeavour from changing patterns of interactional understandings with others. This re‐positioning recognizes that although invitational qualities cannot be deterministically predicted, paying attention to the patterns of cues and signals created from actors interacting together can condition ways of understandings to expand what is possible when work practices also become learning practices.

Creating a standardised teaching and learning framework for social work field placements

© 2014, © 2014 Australian Association of Social Workers. Abstract: Mapping and evaluating a student's progress on placement is a core element of social work education but there has been scant attention to indicate how to effectively create and assess student learning and performance. This paper outlines a project undertaken by the Combined Schools of Social Work to develop a common learning and assessment tool that is being used by all social work schools in Victoria. The paper describes how the Common Assessment Tool (CAT) was developed, drawing on the Australian Association of Social Work Practice Standards, leading to seven key learning areas that form the basis of the assessment of a student's readiness for practice. An evaluation of the usefulness of the CAT was completed by field educators, liaison staff, and students, which confirmed that the CAT was a useful framework for evaluating students' learning goals. The feedback also identified a number of problematic features that were addressed in a revised CAT and rating scale.

Developement and evidencing achievement of graduate learning outcomes in Deakin University's enhanced mooc

There is now a plethora of Massive Open On-line courses (MOOCs) offered worldwide. Whilst many MOOCs focus on discipline-specific content, little attention has been paid to how MOOCs can explicitly help participants develop generic employability skills such as communication, digital literacy, global citizenship and the like. Similarly little attention been paid to explicitly assuring the quality of MOOCs with respect to alignment with regulatory body standards. Deakin University's first MOOC, DeakinPrimer, is an introduction to humanitarian responses to 21st century disasters. It has been designed to assist participants to explicitly evidence generic or employability skills, some of Deakin's eight Graduate Learning Outcomes (GLOs) including communication, digital literacy, critical thinking and global citizenship. Other key features of DeakinPrimer include opportunities for networking with fellow participants and experts within the humanitarian field, and the opportunity to apply for credit towards the Graduate Certificate in International Community Development (level 8 in the Australian Qualifications Framework [AQF]) and for those with a prior Bachelor degree, the Masters in Humanitarian Assistance or the Masters of International Community Development (level 9 in the AQF). DeakinPrimer is designed as a test bed for a learning innovation, particularly micro-credentialing GLOs using digital badges to enable self and peer endorsement of evidence of learning. Badging is integrated in two ways. Firstly, DeakinPrimer participants build portfolios of learning artefacts associated with learning activities, then assess their work against a set of holistic, generic learning outcomes standards rubrics. If they judge their evidence as meeting the required standard, they can claim a badge (self endorsement) associated with particular GLOs. Secondly, participants can request and provide peer feedback and endorsement (using peer badges). The integration of self and peer review in the assessment tasks helps participants develop important employability skills, the ability to critically self-reflect on their own work and critically analyse the work of others and provide evidence-based feedback. DeakinPrimer is scheduled to commence in July 2013. This paper explains the way in which the course curricula has been designed to use technologies to enable participants to curate evidence of learning, and self and peer endorse such learning against defined standards.