traditional sense of teaching and learning. Rather, it is an application that will improve the organization
and documentation, and the way how we deal with the reflection of the educational and training
process.
The online training certificate was developed within the RD project „Online record book for
strengthening the place of learning cooperation” http:www.blok- online.org and is currently
sponsored by the Federal Ministry for Education and Research within the context of the national
programmed „Web 2.0 in Vocational Education”. In the center of the project stands the re-
development of our existing instrument, a paper- based training certificate book, with the help of
inovative online communications technologies. Primary objective is to strengthen the cooperative
learning location between businesses and schools through a unified and common information base.
Overall, the online record book links all stakeholders
participating in
the vocational
education scheme, including students, teachers, vocational trainers and members of the examination
committees at the chambers of trade. The online record book is the digital
conversion of paper-based form of the report booklet in a Web 2.0 application that can be used
anytime, regardless of current place of learning of the trainee. As usual with the classical form of
report specifications, the trainees also document in the web form on a regular basis the temporal and
material process of its apprenticeship. The special feature is the virtual representation of the entire
process of using the record book. This means that not only the time and location independent
performing and reading the report booklet is made possible through the online training certificate, but
also the legally binding acceptance of the report issue by the instructor and the transfer of the record
books contents to the examiners in the respective chambers and guilds.
Figure 1. Implementation of the report in the
online record of formal qualification Main goal is the reliable collection and
presentation of subject specific competences in the context of the vocational training. The measure of
professionally applicable,
well-trained competencies is based upon the trainees initially
assignment in the record book. Here the entries are linked to so-called qualifications, i.e. vocational
training positions from the regulations, which are stored in the system according to the professions
temporal and subject related structure. This assignment active reflection of the training content
edited by the trainees and can thereby strengthen their ability to reflect their own vocational
development.
Captured by the accumulation in the record book and the professional profiles positions
assigned work or study hours in each area, the corresponding actual state is represented ass
achieved by the trainees. With the target actual status indicator both the trainees and trainers are
able to identify whether the trainee has worked according to training policy curriculum at the
particular time and on the necessary activities to a sufficient
extent. Through
the resulting
transparency differences may be easily detected and corrected by the student in a mostly self-determined
way.
Figure 2. screenshot of the development portfolio
Figure 2 shows a screenshot of the development portfolio presented in relation to the
job description for each position of activity as defined by the training regulations and, secondly,
its completion measured by the amount of workload completed in of the overall amount demanded.
2.2 Case
study on
informal vocational
knowledge exchange: A community of practice for industrial safety experts
The concept of the “community oaf practice” is gaining greater interest in the education field
because thee role which communities may play in assisting employees construction of knowledge and
supporting transformation of their practice through group discussions and sharing of knowledge
Putnam Bork, 2000. Therefore, it should be an emphasis on providing opportunities for employees
to participate in professional communities – also going beyond organizational margins. The term
“community of practice” is advocated by Lave and Wenger 1995 alas they describe it as a set of
relationships between persons, activity and their world over time and in relation with other
tangential and overlapping communities of practice.
68
Our solution developed for a Germany wide working professional group of industrial safety
experts is
a community
http:www.sifa- community.de based upon an. online tool. This is
allows to
offer continuous
support and
communication for safety experts in everyday work settings. Typically this group is distributed among
different enterprises or originations, working on safety issues only part time besides other duties.
Safety reacted exchange with other professionals is hindered by the lack of availability of another
safety expert on the same organizations in many cases. Thus face to face exchanges needed to bee
organized in form of extra work activities with quite some effort only.
The community emerged as a subproject of a longtime study the community is online since 2005
cp. Hamper et al., 2005. Since then a growing number of participants network with each other. On
the other hand a number continuous education activities of these professionals for work safety is
triggered by their participation in the online community of practice in a non-formal way. Since
2010 new safety experts get an introduction of how to adopt the community for individual training
needs already during the formal safety education. Currently the Sifa-Community httpp:www.sifa-
community.de has become a valuable online offering to support the continuous development of
safety professionals’ competence in everyday working life funded by the German Statutory
Accident Insurance; cf. Trimpop et al., 2008; Kahnwald et al., 2008. The community went
online a one-year design phase in May 20055 with the goals to network the participants of the long-
term study with each other and to allow a continuous activity-related training of these
industrial safety professionals.
Figure 3. Sifa-Community hhttp:www.sifa-
community.de Since the launch of the community participant
numbers have increased rapidly. Besides the great confidence in Web 2.0, reasons are definitely the
topic and the fact that usually only one specialist for occupational safety exists who needs to
overcome the borders of its company to network with other professionals in a non-physical way.
Especially in 2008 and increase of registered users by around 50 emerged - now the Sifa-Community
is used by more than 3,000 professionals working for the improvement of industrial safety offered.
With increasing numbers of users we could also observe enhanced peer-to-peer activities among the
participants, which may be interpreted as an indication off the high acceptance of the offer.
A key feature of the Sifa-Community is the opportunity off using the forums. Here we may
confirm that with 16411 almost all 98 off the than 1676 users observe at least one forum for
reading and thus receive a daily e-mail notifications about new posts. In almost all cases it is the forum
“SSOS - questions and problems“. Only 25 users 1.5 have not subscribed to this forum. More
than one forum is observed only rarely.
Figure 4. The frequencies of authorship in The
Forum Figure 4 shows the frequencies of authorship
in The Forum: 52 of the 427 authors have posted one or two Messages too their colleagues. 38
have even written 3-11 articles, but only 10 43 people have left 12-559 posts in the forum.
The rationale for the use of the Sifa- Community should analyzed by an evaluation of
the community in the period December 2008 to January 2009. For this purpose, the use of statistics
analysis off collected usage data on the server side, the forums and user profiles data analysis of
the observed forums and evaluated the number of stored contacts, and written posts. These data were
supplemented by statements from an online questionnaire. It was found that information
gathering and problem solving with 63 with 62 are the main motivations in order to use the
community. “Technical assistance” represents for 60 of respondents a further important aspect of
using the platform. The community serves mainly the informal learning in order to solve individual or
local problems, obtain the latest information and network with other professionals. Unlike some
other job-specific online communities the use of the SIFA community is less in leisure time for
exchange, but rather as a working and information tool during working hours. The aspect of
entertainment which is often in relation to other web services is hardly relevant to the respondents.
69
