Arguments for contextual teaching with learning fields in vocational IT schools: results of an interview study among IT and CS training companies

Abstract

Professional IT education and training in Germany consists primarily of two parts: students attend part time vocational school and work as apprentices and employees at their training companies. To promote learning venue cooperation between the partners of vocational education, the curricula in the fields of computer science (CS) and information and communication technologies (IT) are arranged in so-called "Lernfelder"(learning fields), which are supposed to be put into practice by using learning situations. Those are based on real-life working processes and allow contextual learning. Unfortunately, teachers are not putting this idea into practice; one reason for their non-adoption of the concept is a lack of appropriate teaching material which would support them. The interview study we describe in this paper explores the apprentices' IT/CS-related working processes and working environments in various selected training companies. Its results were used to correlate the curriculum's aims and the covered occupational working processes. This is one step further in a larger project that strives to develop exemplary learning situations and helpful tools for several learning fields to support teachers in creating lessons for vocational IT and CS training.