Assessment of social media skills among vocational teachers in Finland

• Information technology penetration in the automotive industry has forced education in upper secondary vocational teaching to radically change. In car mechanic training this has an influence on traditional teaching methods as well as upon the substance of the education. At the same time education is generally changing to use social media (SOME) tools in various novel pedagogical settings. SOME may be seen as one solution to the challenges to the automotive sector. However, teachers need to be motivated to enter into a new era of education. In this case study we explore the upper secondary vocational teachers' ability to utilize SOME in teaching. We planned, tested and verified an assessment tool for evaluating SOME skills among vocational teachers. We also planned and provided training for vocational teachers in the use of SOME tools. Our findings were that the ability to utilize SOME tools among vocational teachers was not good and teachers were surprisingly conservative towards new educational technology. We discovered that utilizing an assessment survey questionnaire before and feedback questionnaire afterwards, greatly benefited a training course by plugging existing knowledge gaps and planning the training accordingly.

Ämnesord

SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP  -- Utbildningsvetenskap -- Pedagogik (hsv//swe)

SOCIAL SCIENCES  -- Educational Sciences -- Pedagogy (hsv//eng)

Nyckelord

Social Media

assessment inquiry

vocational teachers

automotive

Publikations- och innehållstyp

ref (ämneskategori)

kon (ämneskategori)