individuals. It has simply been viewed as a constraint upon the human actions that are
performed within it.
The legacy of these ideas about the relationship between skill and work can be traced
in the design of most vocational curriculum programmes and vocational qualifications
and, moreover, in the use of work experience as a component of those programmes.
Irrespective as to whether vocational programmes were delivered in the workplace or a
training institute, they have tended to replicate the idea that skill can be broken down
into constituent elements by designing discreet curriculum units to teach or train
people to acquire these specific ‘skills’. This approach to the design of vocational
programmes and qualifications, as Tuomi-Gronin & Engestrom (forthcoming) have
observed, rests on Thorndike’s (1924) notion of ‘identical elements’ (i.e. matching
elements of skill to elements of training programmes). One consequence of the
enduring influence of the notion of ‘identical elements’ has been that training
programmes tried develop ‘skills’ in workers by providing tasks that would improve
the operation of their mental faculties, such as memory or attention, or their physical
performance such as, manual dexterity and spatial awareness. Another consequence
has been that most vocational qualifications reinforced these very task specific notions
of occupational skill by accrediting individual elements of skill separately from one
another (Tuomi-Gronin & Engestrom forthcoming).
The above assumptions about the relationship between work tasks, the elements of
skill and the design of training programmes have been assimilated over a period of
time into the language of many EU policymakers. Thus, as Keep & Mayhew observe
(1999), even when policy makers talk about the need for more generic forms of skill,
they still tend to refer to skill in accordance with very traditional criteria. They present
it as though it were a characteristic of a well-defined work role and a clear
specification of desired qualities. Moreover, policymakers retain a belief that
qualifications can be used to certify accurately the level of skill attainment. Defining,
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