The purpose of this paper is to analyse empirical situations from a previous project on vocational learning in Swedish upper secondary vocational education, in order to identify ‘critical aspects’ of vocational knowing. The vocational areas for the programs were textile respective wood work. 

The research design was ethnographically inspired: in each school, initial data were a series of collective remembering sessions with all teachers in each of the two participating schools and programs, followed by a sequence of video-recorded teaching/learning in schools, 

focusing on a few students in each program while they were working with their assignments. Complementary to the video-recordings, teachers were audio-recorded for the purpose of documentation of their conversations with these students during their work. On several occasions, students showed hesitation in their work, but also the pattern observed for these students was similar. All examples analysed for this paper concern students’ hesitation while working with different assignments in school workshops or classrooms. 

The theoretical framework for the project is activity theory. The assignments, the communication between the students and their teacher, the tools they use and the material they were working with were analysed, focusing the ‘critical aspects’ – aspects that seems difficult for students to discern and therefor a didactic challenge since a common aspect of the result they seem crucial with regards to vocational knowing.