1. Dr Elnaz Kashefpakdel Head of Research Education and Employers
Connecting learning to life: preparing children for the forth industrial revolution
Dr Elnaz Kashefpakdel
Head of Research
Education and Employers

2. Forth industrial revolution
The First Industrial Revolution used water and steam power, The Second used electric power to create mass production, The Third used electronics and information technology to automate production.
The Forth
digital revolution, characterized by a fusion of technologies that is blurring the lines between the physical, digital, and biological spheres.
Automation substitutes for labour, displacement of workers by machines
talent, more than capital, will represent the critical factor of production, demand for highly skilled workers
Unforeseeable future, some stable and rewarding jobs with new skills
World economic forum, 2018

3. Implication of structural changes
New labour market becomes more complex, competitive and changing
Growing numbers of employers have a changed sense of what they most desire from the workforce
Current generation of pupils face a significantly greater challenge in making informed investment decisions about the quality and quantity of education and training they pursue in light of an increasingly complex and opaque labour market. 
Personal effectiveness and adaptability at a premium in service/knowledge economy- bility to apply their knowledge in unfamiliar situations becomes more important
Mann and Huddleston, 2016

4. Shifting assumptions and attitudes, broadening horizons, developing realistic aspirations
Pupils benefit from being open-minded with a broadened career and education aspiration
Moving away from traditional assumptions about school to work transitions, anything is possible (vocational pathways)
Stereotypical views about future jobs and the world of work needs change
Social and cultural capital accumulation becomes key: self efficacy, confidence, access to relevant information, connecting learning to life

5. When to start?
At what age do you believe children should start learning about the world of work? (250 primary school across England)
Drawing the future report (2018), in addition to many other academic studied (e.g. ASPIRE) showed clearly that it’s too late to leave intervention to change things to adolescence
Children as young as age 5 start shaping assumptions and ideas about future and they take it very seriously.
In a survey by our team at Education and Employers (March 2018) teachers, for the first time, said the same thing: almost half of the respondents believed exposing children to the future of the world of work should start age 5 and under
Age 5 and under
114 (47%)
Age 5-7 (year 1,2)
50 (21%)
Age 7-9 (year 3 and 4)
32 (13%)
Age 9-11 (year 5 and 6)
28 (11%)

6. Food for thoughts…
As seen in Drawing the future report, children’s ideas about future is shaped by who they meet with the greatest influencers being parents/family and teachers and TV/social media
1) do all parents have access to 21st century labour market information and the trends in skills demand? 2) are all families in work? Do children live in an area of high deprivation with low employment? Do all families arrange for work-related learning activities, or have access to resources to do so? 3) do teachers have time in the curriculum to spare to address these issues? 4) do they think its their responsibility? 5) are parents and teachers aware of the impacts? 6) does TV programmes and social media perpetuate the gender stereotypical views on jobs and careers and what men and women can and cannot do? 7) do children understand that social media (technology) can change the way they develop in a constructive way? And many more…………

7. Schools tackling limited access to social and cultural capital
In a study by Percy and Kashefpakdel (2018) it is shown than schools can partly compensate for pupils with prior disadvantage of social and cultural capital by inviting people from outside school and exposing students to the reality of world of work, on top of the routine career provisions in place. And schools with more intense programmes will even benefit more.
Teachers in our 2018 survey of primary schools testify this: 94% of the schools think it is important to invite volunteers from the world of work to engage in activities offered to children in primary
However, in Drawing the Future report, we showed less than 1% of the children heard about jobs they want to do from people visiting their school in the UK
Let’s add all this to an equation and conclude one thing= Can we do more and do it early enough?

8. Policy is finally keeping up with research!
There has been amazing initiatives in the past recognised the need and attempted to influence policy
Looking at the past social mobility reports, from Coalition government’s Opening doors, breaking barriers: a strategy for social mobility (2011) to recent reports by the House of Lords Select Committee (2016) and the Social Mobility Commission (2017) there is scant reference to the vital role that primary schools play in raising aspirations, challenging stereotypes, broadening horizons and connecting children’s learning to their future lives
But a movement started at last: In the Career Strategy: making the most of everyone’s skills and talent published by the Department for Education in December 2017, the role of primary schools in introducing children to the world of work was cited and the government announced plans to test and fund career activities that works.
Policy is finally keeping up with research!

9. Despite government recent recognition, schools are doing a fair amount to prepare their children for the future
In our survey of 250 primary schools, 194 said they organise activities to introduce children to the word of work.
Considering the impact of region, resources and accountability, schools in our sample across England are doing some good work:

10. Why does it matter?
Strongly agree
Agree
Disagree
Strongly disagree
They can be very influential in broadening children’s aspiration
64%
33% 2% 0%
They can bring learning to life and increase motivation 1%
They help to challenge gender stereotyping about jobs and subjects studied
66%
32%
They help children to believe in their abilities (self-efficacy)
50%
44%
They can change children’s attitude positively towards school
46% 5%
They can change children’s attitude positively towards learning leading to improved academic attainment 4%
They help link school subjects to the world of work
57%
39%
They can help parents/carers to gain insights to the world of work.
30%
47%
10% 3%
The primary schools responded to our survey told us why it is important to do jobs-related learning activities, which validates our prior theories on careers learning in primary (2018)
In a survey in 2017 we asked nearly 500 teachers for their views on whether employer engagement can have a positive impact on academic outcomes. We found: 90% of primary school teachers thought that engaging children with employers/employees and the world of work has an impact on their academic achievement % agreed that engagement with the world of work can change young people’s attitudes positively towards school

11. And teachers think arranging these activities with people from the world of work maximises the impact
Learning about jobs ad careers in primary is seen as a resource which can be harnessed in the development of knowledge and skills and applied as a mechanism to influence the attitudes and aspirations of pupils:
At one level, the employee volunteer can be seen as simply supplementing the work of teachers: providing access to extra resource to achieve core teaching objectives (eg, reading and number skills).
At a second, we can conceive engagement as a resource which enables access to additional objectives: developing enterprise or employability skills, raising or broadening aspirations, challenging thinking about the point of education. Across these areas, it makes a very significant difference that the human resource in question is someone bringing real life, authentic experience of the workplace
* Access to resources is not equitably distributed across society, it is found in different formations across different social groups - and engaging volunteers from the world of work (whether to supplement teachers’ work or to achieve a certain objective) provides schools with a means of democratising access to trustworthy insights and personal experiences of ultimate economic relevance.

12. Coming back to where I started…
Introducing children to the world of work from early age can help in numerous ways:
To challenge assumptions and attitudes about certain pathways/subjects….seeing what people do and how they got there from a range of industries across gender groups
To cultivate skills needed for the every changing society/labour market…adaptability, creativity, resilience
To broaden horizons… anything is possible!
To connect learning and life… why getting good grades matter, why learning science
if we are serious about improving social mobility and closing the skills gap and respond to the demand of the 21st century labour market it needs to start from early ages and schools and employers play a pivotal role in making this possible.

13. Elnaz.Kashef@educationandemployers.orh @Edu_Eresearch
The next generation of our leaders are in primary school now, we should support them grow realistic aspirations and learn skills that can be used in times of uncertainty and change
Thank you!
@Edu_Eresearch