Digital Competence of Cookery Teachers in Vocational Education: A Systematic Literature Review

Abstract

The rapid digitization of the modern educational landscape has fundamentally altered instructional design, delivery, and assessment across diverse occupational sectors. Within Technical-Vocational-Livelihood (TVL) tracks, specifically cookery education, integrating digital methodologies poses a unique structural challenge due to the heavily hands-on, safety-sensitive, and performance-based nature of culinary instruction. This study presents a systematic literature review examining the digital competence of cookery educators as a foundational basis for contextual framework development. Operating under the structural conventions of contemporary educational review literature, this study proposes and applies the novel five-dimensional V-TPAC Model (Vocational, Technological, Pedagogical, Anthropocentric, and Contextual parameters) to synthesize relevant local and international research published between 2022 and 2026. The thematic synthesis reveals that while macro-level frameworks like DigCompEdu and broad theoretical constructs like TPACK offer strong global baselines, they fail to account for specific vocational realities such as laboratory-based sensory engagement, physical safety protocols, and resource constraints typical of rural school blocks. Empirical findings demonstrate that cookery teachers frequently manifest uneven digital capabilities, with pronounced weaknesses in digital content creation and performance-based digital assessment. Conversely, targeted interventions—including AI-driven culinary simulations, localized video scaffolding, and collaborative peer mentoring—significantly optimize teacher instructional confidence, creative preparedness, and terminal student employability. This review bridges a distinct empirical gap by detailing how global standards must be structurally combined with workplace-oriented vocational models to guide targeted professional development, refine TVL curricula, and support resilient ICT policy execution in emerging education frameworks.