“Economy 4.0 needs Education 4.0”

The digital transformation of the world of work will also bring about increasing change in learning media and in company teaching and learning processes in initial and continuing vocational education and training. “For this reason, we should not only focus on the effects of the spread of digital technology on company and production processes and on the resultant changes in skills requirements that arise for the employees,” stresses the President of the Federal Institute for Vocational Education and Training (BIBB), Friedrich Hubert Esser. “Economy 4.0 needs Education 4.0. We need to devote just as much concentrated attention to teaching and learning via the use of digital media and to the changing technical and media education competences of training staff and trainees.”

Professor Esser is of the view that the proportion and significance of digital media in educational and added value processes will continue to increase. He believes that learning will be more individual and more mobile in future, will take place on learning platforms, via social media or in virtual classrooms and will be independent of time and venue. “All of this will have implications for the structure and forms of learning in initial and continuing vocational education and training,” he went on. “However, trainees, employees and training staff will need to be trained in media-aided learning and teaching.” Professor Esser feels that training staff in particular will need assistance and continuing training for their new role as supporters of teaching and learning because trainers are the crucial target group within the companies for learning and activity in a world of work going digital.

Initial results emerging from BIBB research projects presented last week at BIBB in Bonn at a conference entitled “Vocational education and training – automation, digitalisation and polarisation”, have shown that it is highly likely that the IT and media competence needed by training staff in future can be defined. Professor Esser sees this as a route to the subsequent description of models for IT and media competence. He considers such models to be important in order ultimately to serve as a basis for the development of excellent and quality-certified continuing training concepts for training staff which can be used for the targeted activation of the potential of digital media, something which has in no way been fully exploited as yet. In terms of content, the focus could be on aspects such as the imparting of specialist knowledge via wikis, blogs, apps or explanatory videos in order to provide preparation for online examinations or deliver additional knowledge in the areas of IT, IT security and data protection.
In order to bring trainers up to speed for a “Vocational education and training 4.0” concept that is structured in this way, BIBB has been commissioned by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) to provide support for the programme “Digital media in vocational education and training”. A travelling road show visiting different event venues stages user workshops for trainers which present deployment scenarios for digital media in training practice for joint piloting. Because of its success and the high level of demand, BIBB will continue this road show in 2017.

The BIBB trainer portal at www.foraus.de has also put a new current main thematic focus online entitled “Digitalisation of the world of work and employment". This new service for company-based training staff offers hints and conceptual provision on an ongoing basis for user-oriented handling of digital media in training and provides support for the operationalisation of the specific training remit in a digitalised world of work.

For further information, please visit www.foraus.de and www.qualifizierungdigital.de

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