Performance improvement of technical and vocational education in the Kingdom of Bahrain

_____________________________________________________________________ II DECLERATION__________________________________________________________________ III AKNOWLEDGMENT_____________________________________________________________ IV TABLE OF CONTENTS___________________________________________________________ V CHAPTER 1Introduction_________________________________________________________ 1 1.1 The Historical Development of the TVE System in Bahrain............................................. 2 1.2 The Present TVE Structure.................................................................................... 3 1.3 TVE Characteristics.............................................................................................. 5 1.4 Justifications of the Research................................................................................. 9 1.4.1 Employability Skills Gap............................................................................................... 9 1.4.2 Need for Up-to-Date Engineering Courses..................................................................... 12 1.4.3 Need for Modern Teaching and Learning Processes for Engineering Courses...................... 12 1.4.4 Need for Using Technology into Teaching and Learning Processes.................................. 13 1.5 Organisation of the Thesis.................................................................................... 14 CHAPTER 2Literature Review____________________________________________________ 16 2.1 Employability Skills Models.................................................................................. 16 2.2 Theories and Models of Learning for Educational Research and Practice.............................. 23 2.2.1 Cognitive Learning Theories........................................................................................... 24 2.2.2 Bloom’s Taxonomy....................................................................................................... 27 2.2.3 Experiential Learning Theory......................................................................................... 31 2.3 Impact of Using Technology in Teaching and Learning Processes....................................... 34 2.4 Information Quality Frameworks............................................................................. 35 2.5 Development of Questionnaires and Data Analysis to Responses........................................ 39 2.6 Conclusions...................................................................................................... 40 2.7 Scope and Objectives of the Study........................................................................... 41 2.8 Research Plan.................................................................................................... 42 CHAPTER 3 The Proposed Employability Skills Training Model________________________ 45 3.1 The Design for Questionnaire 1 (Employability Skills Questionnaire).................................. 45 3.2 Categories of Respondents to the Questionnaire............................................................. 47 3.3 Data Analysis................................................................................................... 48 3.3.1 Data Analysis for Part 1(Evaluation of Respondents Details).............................................. 48 3.3.2 Data Analysis for Part 2 (Evaluation Based on Bloom’s Taxonomy).................................... 50 3.3.3 Responses to Part 3............................................................................................ 62 3.4 The Rationale for Developing an Employability Skills Training Model................................. 63 3.5 The Proposed Employability Skills Training Model....................................................... 66 3.5.1 Category 1 Cognitive and Psychomotor Skills................................................................ 67