Industry 4.0 and Vocational Education and Training

The Taccle AI and VET project has been working with the BBS 2 vocational school in Wolfsburg, Germany. The school has close links with industry, particularly Volkswagen who have a major manufacturing plant in Wolfsburg. They are developing a series of projects around Industry 4.0 which is largely based on digitalisation, data and the use of Artificial Intelligence. The school has recently produced a video in English (see bottom of page on the Foraus website) entitled Smart factory - Industry 4.0 in Vocational Education and Training. They say:

Teaching the complex interrelationships of Industry 4.0 in vocational training places new demands on training staff and makes modern teaching concepts necessary. At BBS 2 - the „Vocational School 2" - in Wolfsburg, this has led to a conceptual change in the vocational training of automation and mechatronics technicians.

In this deductive approach (from general to specific), the training begins with a digital overall system that serves as a model for professional action. System interrelationships, structure, modes of operation, malfunctions and problem solutions can be taught, learned and discovered using the model of a smart factory as an example. Based on this, the individual components and subsystems can then be understood and comprehended within the overall system.

In the classroom, the complex technologies and processes of Industry 4.0 become tangible in the truest sense of the word. Here, trainees for automation technology and dual students have developed and built a compact smart factory filling system themselves. It works with the same technical components as a production plant in industry.
To support the young people's independent learning, the trainees have developed a learning platform, which also serves the cooperation between training, school, production and industry partners.