How does it feel?: An exploration of teaching perceptive sensoriality in hairdressing education

This study explores vocational didactics and embodied knowledge in hairdressingeducation by studying how perceptive sensoriality is used by teachers and students increating shared understandings of vocational knowledge. Among multiple actions,touch is distinguished as a central resource in learning the vocation, as it emerges ininteraction between teacher and student related to the ongoing teaching and itsassignment. The data is based on video-recordings displaying how touch is used inmanipulating objects and material, or in assessing qualities and defects. In suchinstances, touch becomes a diagnostic criterion (Goodwin, 1997) to investigate how thematerial worked with can be evaluated and handled. To bridge the gap betweenindividual and collective vocational knowledge, metaphors are of use. The results showtwo approaches to the teaching of perceptive sensoriality. In order to learn the vocationalsubject content the teaching need to provide for and practice the individual’s embodiedsense of touch as well as the vocation’s verbalised collective feel. This is the core of thedidactical challenge.