Social Realism Symposium: International perspectives on knowledge and the curriculum

This presentation reviews the curricular and pedagogical development of professional courses in higher education, with close attention to understandings of the importance of the professional context as it is realised in the design of the curriculum in the UK. This review is used as the site of analysis to map the research undertaken and the professional practice that has emerged. Issues associated with the role, effects and implications of work related learning in education are examined in the light of this mapping of the professional curriculum. The notions of professional knowledge and professional practice that are prevalent at this time are used to reflect on the ‘know-how’ and the ‘know-what’ in professional education and how this delineates the formation of specialist knowledge and expertise. The presentation concludes by considering what response we might make to the need for knowledge building in professional / vocational fields and how to investigate it.