Subject Leader

Getting Started

This pathway is designed for subject lead teachers in technical subjects in further education colleges or other similar providers. We will focus on the subject specialist pedagogy of technical education and training, although using the term pedagogy can be controversial in further education settings in England. The government's Commission on Adult Vocational Teaching and Learning (CAVTL) found that "A robust vocational teaching and learning system must be underpinned by a serious focus on vocational pedagogy.  And yet, as we have gone round the country visiting sites of vocational teaching and learning and in our seminars, of all the terms we have discussed the one that gets people most agitated is ‘pedagogy’” (CAVTL 2013, p13). This may reflect the relatively weak status of technical education and training in comparison to academic education, which dominates perceptions and policies in England. Discussing pedagogy for academic subjects is considered entirely normal, but not for technical courses. To quote Lucas and his colleagues in a report for City and Guilds, "The evidence suggests that serious consideration of pedagogy is largely missing in vocational education and … vocational learners are the losers as a result of this omission” (Lucas et al. 2012, p13). We agree, which is why we have produced these resources to inform and improve your pedagogical decision-making in order to improve the experience and the learning of your students.