Exploring student‐centred learning in GNVQs: case‐studies of classroom practice

This article, which is based upon ESRC‐funded research, utilizes two case‐studies to explore the nature of teaching and learning within GNVQs. A model which emphasizes the exertion of student control across different dimensions of learning is used to clarify the meaning of student‐centred learning in the two examples. The discussion of teaching and learning in GNVQs is contextualized within an account of the development of the qualification and a review of research findings which have explored the constraints and opportunities which GNVQs offer for the development of student‐centred learning. The article concludes by suggesting that while there are powerful constraints on student‐centred learning within GNVQs, particularly with regard to assessment, these are mediated in practice by the pedagogical principles, curricular specialisms and institutional locations of the teachers responsible for the courses.