Career education as literacy apprenticeship: A case study of literacy events

Stephen A Wellinski, Purdue University

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to document and describe the literacy events and the literacy practices of adolescents in a career center. Using the theoretical underpinnings of the New Literacy Studies, this case study investigated and depicted the literacy stories of two career programs—Health Occupations and Welding Technology. Using comparative, within-case, and cross-case analysis on the collected data—observation, fieldnotes, interviewing, and video/audio taping, these literacy stories illuminated how literacy events and the embedded literacy practices function in the different communities of practice that adolescents will encounter in a particular career education program areas. This study points to a need to expand traditional notions of literacy that target print-based skills that are considered to be generalizable to various workplace scenarios. It concurrently points to the value of a more inclusive and socially relevant view of literacy involving both print and job-related talk that can inform the construction of more relevant career education programs that immerses adolescents in transitional communities (e.g., “apprenticeships”) to expose them to the discursive practices that serve the function of enculturating them into the world of work while also equipping them with discursive practices that help them perform job-related tasks.

Degree

Ph.D.

Advisors

O'Brien, Purdue University.

Subject Area

Curricula|Teaching|Literacy|Reading instruction|Vocational education

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