Experience within colleges and on training courses for lecturers in further education shows that the teachers recruited to teach in further education (FE), and those experienced lecturers now being trained, struggle to cope in a constantly changing educational environment. The requirements of handling the information needed to become effective practitioners leaves little time to make sense of what lies behind and ahead for FE. The Foster and Leitch reports on the future of FE and the skill needs of the economy have intensified the process of change, making it imperative for lecturers to have a broader understanding of the forces that are shaping their working lives. This book sets out to provide a unique and provocative guide to those lecturers committed to teaching in the changing world of FE.It examines key issues such as how teaching in FE differs from others sectors, the motivations of learners, the use of new technologies in the classroom, the emphasis on key skills, the techniques adopted by college managers, the changing assessment methods and the introduction of personalised learning, the new vulnerable idea of 'youth' in the transition to work, as well as an analysis of the politics behind the training of lecturers. The authors are all united in wanting an inspiring vision of FE. As one of the editors says, 'there are a lot of good lecturers in FE whose potential to inspire and challenge students is being wasted'. It is to these teachers that this book is addressed.

Too often teachers new to FE are discomforted and unconvinced by the rhetoric of college managers and government Quangos. In reaction to this, they easily succumb to the de-moralised cynicism of the FE staff room. Too often the books they are asked to read and the training they are required to undergo is facile and undemanding, but very time consuming. This book is the antidote to all of this - it is the thinking lecturer's guide to FE.