Relying on observational and interview data from a clinical practice class in a graduate physical therapy program, I examine, within a situated cognition framework, the teaching and learning of a concept in biomechanics, the manual techniques and tactile discrimination skills that accompany it, and the diagnostic frame of mind that informs concept, technique, and skill. In examining this complex set of practices, I hope to add to and qualify the literature on working knowledge, participation and competence, and situated learning and pedagogy.Jody and Martina were naturals for a program like this. Excellent students, they also had rich experience with physical performance and biomedicine. Martina was a volleyball player in college, majored in athletic training, and volunteered for over five years in a hospital acute care unit, assisting in physical therapy, helping patients become ambulatory, and the like. Jody majored in biology, was athletic, and volunteered for three years in a physical therapy clinic where she performed a number of tasks, administering ultrasound, doing "a little soft-tissue work," and so on. Their backgrounds were fairly typical of the 40 students enrolled in the graduate physical therapy program at Mount Saint Mary's College on the west side of Los Angeles, a rigorous 28-month mix of course work and clinical experience leading to a master's degree in physical therapy. Jody and Martina were in their second semester of a curriculum that spans seven terms and includes courses in anatomy and physiology (gross anatomy, orthopedics, neurology, cardiopulmonary function, etc.), classes in the procedures and practice of physical therapy (these range from introductions to the field and its modes of treatment, to interpersonal and professional communication, to research methods, to ethics and the law), clinical courses in which students putbiomedical knowledge into practice (e.g., orthopedic management, assessment of neurologic dysfunction, etc.), and a number of directed research practice and supervised clinical internships. Generally, these courses are sequenced by level of difficulty, and there is a cumulative thrust to them. So, for example, biomechanical concepts learned early on are revisited and elaborated in later courses, with the expectation that students will be able to reason about etiology and treatment in ever more complex ways.