Communication is key: an examination of the development of communication key skills in vocational education in China

Crucial to learning from the past and anticipating the future is how we communicate. What stories that we have been told? What lessons have we learned and shared? In vocational education, communication has sometimes seemed marginalised, ostensibly labelled a ‘key’ or ‘core’ skill, it has formed part of a set of skills to be learned alongside or integrated within a wider skill set. In the last ten years, China has emerged on the world stage as a dynamic economy and a developing society, and with that the recognition that what China says and does will impact on all our global futures. Education and especially vocational education has been at the forefront of China’s recent development. The research on which this paper is based explores the introduction of key skills communication into Chinese vocational education, an initiative established in 1999 when the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party and the National State Council identified the need for ‘key skills’, and reinforced this need by subsequent research in China suggesting that communication is an important component of vocational education (Ye and Li, 2007) and that the ability to communicate effectively is instrumental to success and career development (Tong and Zhong, 2008). Based on case studies within vocational colleges, the paper investigates what communication key skills mean in a Chinese context and asks what lessons can be learned from the past for the future while questioning the transferability of notions of communication. It analyses how motivation might affect learner success; the relationship of pedagogy to curriculum; and the impact of student-centred learning. Finally, it suggests how communication through sustainability literacies might be key to longer-term development.