This book generates a comprehensive account of ways in which practice-based learning has been
conceptualized in the Francophone context. Learning for occupations and the educational and
practice-based experiences supporting it are the subject of increased interest and attention
globally. Governments professional bodies workplaces and workers are now looking for
experiences that support the initial and ongoing development of occupational capacities.
Consequently more attention is being given to workplaces as sites for this learning. This
focus on learning through work has long been emphasised in the Francophone world which has
developed distinct traditions and conceptions of associations between work and learning. These
include ergonomics and professional didactics. Yet whilst being accepted and of long standing
in the Francophone world these conceptions and traditions and the practices supporting them
are little known about or understood in the Anglophone world which is the dominant medium for
scientific and educational discussion. This book addresses this problem through drawing on
accounts from France Switzerland and Canada that make accessible and elaborate these
traditions conceptions and practices through examples of their applications to occupationally
related learning. These accounts offer variations and culturally-specific developments of these
traditions but collectively emphasize a preoccupation with how both work and learning need to
be understood through situated considerations of persons enacting their work practice. In this
way they offer noteworthy and worthwhile contributions to contemporary global considerations
of learning through work.
