The foundations of effective…

The foundations of effective general formation in vocational education: how to train tomorrow’s teachers?

Karel Van Nieuwenhuyse

KU Leuven (Belgium)

Project General Studies (PGS) is a unique, demanding, and complex school subject. It encompasses general education within vocational secondary education organized by the Flemish Community (Belgium) and integrates content from no less than six disciplines: Dutch, mathematics, history, geography, natural sciences, and citizenship. This integration is not an end in itself, but a means of enabling learners to experience reality as a coherent whole and to foster their interest in society. Effective PGS education requires solid foundations – and that is precisely what the PGS didactics focuses on in teacher training.

A first foundation is the functional nature of PGS. In the program, prospective teachers learn to start from meaningful and functional contexts that connect with the living environment, current events, and future professional reality of learners. Topics such as dealing with money, social media, health, housing, the use of gen-AI, the importance of safety at work, the design of a new playground, the importance of the rule of law, and how to apply for a job make abstract learning objectives concrete. Functionality is always linked to three areas of development: personal growth (self-confidence, resilience, identity, substantiated opinion-forming), social development (citizenship, participation in democratic society, self-reliance), and professional preparation. This makes learning relevant and motivates learners in vocational education who do not always feel engaged by traditional school knowledge.

In addition, a fundamental aspect of PGS is the cross-disciplinary and integrated teaching and learning of content. PGS transcends subject boundaries and aims to enable learners to learn in a coherent manner. This requires prospective teachers to have thorough Pedagogical Content Knowledge (PCK). They must have a good mastery of content within a discipline (CK) and of general pedagogical-didactic knowledge (PK) (e.g., about classroom management, diversity, instructional strategies, motivation, and affective processes). PCK intertwines both of the above in order to teach a specific theme or topic at the intersection of subjects in a powerful way. To this end, the program offers separate asynchronous online CK (with an introduction to basic knowledge per discipline) and PK (including classroom management) modules. In-person sessions focus on developing PCK through a design assignment in which prospective teachers collaboratively design effective integrated (from thematic transdisciplinary project-based) learning environments.

The design of effective PGS-education in practice is offered through a structured and goal-oriented design cycle consisting of several phases: choosing a topic and determining learning objectives (including divergent and convergent brainstorming), an initial structuring of learning content, teaching and learning activities, and learning materials with attention to forms of evaluation and feedback, a constructive alignment check, concrete elaboration, and a reflection phase as a conclusion. A qualitative rubric for designing effective PGS learning environments accompanies the cycle (see other resource linked on the resource bank: “qualitative rubric for designing effective PGS learning environments).

In training prospective PGS teachers, a lot of attention is paid to dealing with diversity, differentiation, and care for learners. For PGS-classes are characterized by a high degree of heterogeneity among learners in all respects (socio-economic, ethnic-cultural, religious-philosophical, intellectual, linguistic, motivational, etc.). Prospective teachers therefore learn to consciously deal with all these aspects when designing effective PGS-education. Differentiation is approached as a balancing act with an eye for all learners: support but also sufficient challenge where necessary, and setting high expectations for all learners.