Critical perspectives on childhood career development learning: expanding horizons

Abstract

This special issue on career development learning in childhood is a response to an identi fi ed gap in the literature that calls for a more detailed focus on this topic. The lack of a detailed focus on career development learning in childhood, speci fi cally intentional learning, has been identi fi ed for some time as “ a missed opportunity ” (Porfeli & Lee, 2012, p. 20). This gap becomes more evident as the literature on children ’ s career development continues to evolve its focus to diverse populations and diverse contextual and systemic factors that may impact such development. Concomitant with an increase in the literature on children ’ s career development are ongoing attempts at identify-ing core development career constructs in children ’ s career development (Oliveira et al., 2017). The call for a more speci fi c focus on career development learning in childhood is timely for several reasons. One is the persistent suggestion that there is a need to understand more holistically how learning (both unintentional and intentional) and development interrelate in children ’ s career development. A second reason is that the literature has predominantly focused on unintentional learning to date (Crause et al., 2017), despite an understanding that intentional learning during the career exploration stage of childhood can enhance later lifespan career development (Porfeli & Lee, 2012; Watson et al., 2016). Concurrent