Improving Learning Cultures in Further Education
Understanding How Students Learn

Aims to develop a way of understanding educational improvement which focuses on the formation and transformation of the practices through which students learn. This book generates insight into various practices of teaching and learning. It is useful for researchers, policymakers and practitioners for implementing change for the better.

Through its unique theoretical framework - a cultural understanding of teaching and learning - this book develops a new way of understanding educational improvement, one which focuses on the formation and transformation of the practices through which students learn. Based on detailed ethnographic research of seventeen learning sites in further education colleges, this book generates a unique insight into a wide variety of practices of teaching and learning. Illustrated by case studies, it is structured around three key questions: What do learning cultures in FE look like and how do they transform over time? How do learning cultures transform people? And, How can people (tutors, managers, policy makers, but also students) transform learning cultures for the better? Through a combination of theory and analysis, "Improving Learning Cultures in Further Education" makes a strong case for the importance of a cultural approach to the improvement of teaching and learning in further education and provides practical guidance for researchers, policymakers and practitioners for implementing change for the better.

PART 1 WHAT ARE THE ISSUES?
1 Improving learning cultures in Further Education?
2 Learning cultures and a cultural theory of learning
PART 2 WHAT DOES THE RESEARCH TELL US?
3 Improving teaching and learning in FE: a policy history
4 Learning cultures across sites
5 The learning practices and the practices of learning
6 Changing the culture:interventions and mediations
7 Professionality in FE learning cultures
PART 3 WHAT ARE THE OVERALL IMPLICATIONS?
8 Conclusions: transforming learning cultures in Further Education
METHODOLOGICAL APPENDIX