Removal of constraints - "Entgrenzung des Lernens":

That the pressure towards lifelong learning is growing seems undeniable. But the reactions of different education 'cultures' to such economic and social change is different.

In the UK the stress is on ever faster technology implementation linked to ease of access to flexible course provision.

Germany has been resistant to such change. Technology implementation is limited in education and training. Access to educational and training is still governed by traditional barriers - both educational and social.

But there is a growing movement to promote self learning competences - to provide learners with the competence to direct their own learning. In this regard Germany is building on traditions around key qualifications and autodidactic learning.

Seb Fiedler's comments are interesting in this regard:

"If we accept this description of how the concept of "learning" is changing, we can speculate about what kind of "learning cultures" are likely to emerge. If we are (really) increasingly forced into a continuous, (largely) self-organised process of change, an efficient learning culture would support the improvement of our capability for such self-organised change.

What role should/could "pedagogical" work play under such circumstances? It becomes very hard to maintain the ideal of linear transformations from a situation of well determined deficiencies towards a set of well determined goals. So, what else? And... if we cannot pre-scribe and pre-design our instructional means to ensure the desired tranformation(s), what actions and interactions should/could be meaningfully enhanced or supported through the application of ICTs?

If we really want to talk about "personal learning environments", we should be very explicit about our assumptions on how the overall circumstances are (very likely) developing and what kind of interventions remain possible under these emerging conditions.

Too many "wet dreams" of technologically enhanced learning are simply ignoring their dependency on assumptions of determinable deficiencies, determinable goals and outcomes, and the controllability of the necessary transformations."

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