This paper investigates the role of the lifelong learning discourse in actual governmentality. Starting with a description of the origins of lifelong learning in the discussions about alternative education in the 1960s and 1970s, the current adoption of lifelong learning by the European Union is used to show its critical components. Along with the distinction between formal and informal learning it is demonstrated how lifelong learning attempts to change the field of (...) learning from enclosed environments to a totality of learning events, while at the same time attempting to change the individuals into self‐organizing learners. We show that lifelong learning has a crucial role within the strategies of subjectivation, since its mandate is to provide individuals with the necessary skill‐sets. Finally the methodological prerequisites of the administration of Lifelong Learning are investigated, showing the corresponding developments in the European Union and their contribution to generating a European population. (shrink)

The intent of this research article is to argue with the line of reasoning of arguments from Paul Hager and other educational theorists against the front-end model of education. The model is rejected because it cannot be achieved in occupational preparation, and, moreover, those critics said that it is based on a wrong idea of conceptual interpretation of learning that makes it less conducive to lifelong learning in the long run. The framework which is rejected is a (...) sharp distinction of two concepts; process and product. The reason of rejection is that the sharp distinction does not exist. However, from the research, many analyses show that the front-end model is one of the most important aspects of employment and vocational education, which is the belief that actual practice at work will guarantee the skills of learners before they enter the actual operation. Based on a method of postmodern philosophical analysis, I found that the relationship between education and work is a highly complex relationship. The result of this complexity makes it impossible to have a perfect reason for Hager and his colleagues to reject the significance of the front-end model as concluded by their previous research. On the other hand, I argue that we would have more weight in reasoning if we are to point out that the new policy of lifelong learning still requires a new interpretation on integrity of front-end model of career preparation. This is because the more plausible definition of human being from Hannah Arendt is related to work and working. From what is conceptualized here as an argument of imperfect employability, I pointed out that the rejection of front-end model itself has an important base of conceptualization that does not match the definition of such conditions of being human. Therefore, the rejection of front-end model should be considered as an argument that does not yet have enough weight in reasoning. (shrink)

This article describes and discusses research into lifelong learning in secondary schools that was undertaken at the Australian Council for Educational Research. The project explored ways of helping secondary school students develop an intrinsic interest in learning, in the belief that such an approach will encourage young people to keep learning throughout their lives. Skills and values that help young people to develop characteristics of lifelong learners are outlined. The article suggests that development of these (...) characteristics may be impeded by the strong influence of competitive end-of-school assessment in many schools, and the difficulty of changing the practices and attitudes of some of the people who play a significant role in a young person's education: parents and teachers. (shrink)

Providing high-quality education for students with emergent proficiency in the language of instruction (referred to here as multilingual students) presents a challenge to inclusion for educational systems the world over. In Austria, a new German language support model was implemented in the school year 2018/19 which provides language support in separate classrooms up to 20 h a week. Since its implementation, the model has been strongly criticized for excluding multilingual students from the mainstream classroom, which is argued to reinforce the (...) educational disadvantages that they face. The study presented here provides unprecedented qualitative insight into how schooling for students within the so-called German language support classes (GLSC) was organized during the COVID-19 pandemic. It builds on results of a previous large-scale quantitative study (n= 3,400 teachers), which was conducted during the first lockdown (spring 2020) and indicated a high risk of exclusion for marginalized students, especially for multilingual students in GLSC. To gain deeper insights into the situation of these students during school closures, 37 teachers who work in these classes at both primary and lower-secondary schools in Vienna were interviewed, of which 18 interviews were considered for analysis. The interviews focus on the situation during the first and second school closures in the city of Vienna. A thematic analysis of the interview data reveals teachers’ perceptions of aspects which harmed or promoted inclusion for students in GLSC during these periods of school closure. Teachers’ perceptions of the most harming factors for students included strong language barriers between teachers and students, restricted access to technical equipment and supportive learning spaces, and low parental engagement. A development that promoted inclusion of these students was the option to allow them to come to school during the second school closure. Since existing studies on the schooling of students during school closures have hardly addressed the situation of students in GLSC, this study contributes to closing this research gap. (shrink)

Lifelong learning is presented as a means for enabling individuals, organisations and nations to meet the challenges of an increasingly competitive world. It suggests an extension of opportunity,involving all adults, whatever their interests or experience. There is also, however, a strong sense of expectation, even compulsion, with emphasis given to vocational forms of study and participation.

Despite the expansion of post-school education and incentives to participate in lifelong learning, institutions and labour markets continue to interlock in shaping life chances according to starting social position, family and private resources. The dominant view that the economic and social returns to public investment in adult learning are too low to warrant large-scale public funding has been challenged by recent LLAKES research that shows significant returns to participants in lifelong learning with improvements in both (...) their employability and employment prospects. It is argued that, under conditions of growing social polarisation and economic uncertainty, lifelong learning can have a significant protective effect by keeping adults close to a changing labour market. In this paper we review research from different disciplinary and epistemological traditions, providing evidence of the beneficial effects of lifelong learning, especially when taking into account the dynamics of the life course. Transitions and turning-points in youth and in adult life are markers of diversification of the life course; how far these diversifications amount to 'de-standardisation' of the life course is debated. They involve biographical negotiation, in which any decision is consequential upon previous decisions and involves the exercise of contextualised preferences as well as the calculations of 'rational choice'. Gaining a better understanding of how changing demands are negotiated at different life stages offers a new perspective, moving from narrow versions of rational choice theory towards models of biographical negotiation as promising avenues for effective policy-making. (shrink)

This book presents a unique classification and review of various mental health and learning issues. The authors link current education and child and youth mental health reforms to make the case for improving services to address barriers to learning.

Citizenship and its education is again gaining importance in many countries. This paper uses England as its primary example to develop a Habermasian perspective on this issue. The statutory requirements for citizenship education in England imply that significant attention be given to the moral and social development of the learner over time, to the active engagement of the learner in community and to the knowledge skills and understanding necessary for political action. This paper sets out a theoretical framework that offers (...) a perspective on learning suitable for these far-reaching aims. We argue that schools need to shift from the currently dominant discourse of accountability to incorporate a discourse of care in order to make room for an effective and appropriate pedagogy for citizenship. Habermas’s social theory gives us a theoretical framework that properly locates schools within the lifeworld as part of civil society. Schools should therefore attend to hermeneutical and emancipatory concerns, not only to strategic interests. We put these in the context of Habermas’s social theory to paint an alternative vision learning for citizenship education which is based in developing the dispositions, values and attitudes necessary for lifelong learning with a view to developing ongoing communicative action. (shrink)

Lifelong learning should embrace more than instrumental purposes. Some late modern social formations threaten individual autonomy, subordinating the needs of 'agent' in a 'locality' to universalising rationality, necessary for growth in a globalized and virtualised economy. These phenomena are discussed and illustrated. Learning, now an 'economic' activity, could bind individuals in heteronymously defined lifeworlds. Prerequisites of an alternative conceptualisation are examined.

A tendency of previous studies of lifelong learning to focus on learning and learning subjectivities may have led to an underestimation of potential effects in terms of a system of knowledge constitutive processes that operates powerfully to shape our societies. In this paper we explore lifelong learning and practices in the construction of knowledge at the point where a new relationship is being attempted between university courses and workplaces through programmes for learning. Drawing (...) from Foucault and others we argue a strategic relation between discourses of lifelong learning and knowledge practices in such locations. Discourses of lifelong learning appear to support the reaching out of disciplinary practices into the workplace where theoretical knowledge is combined with knowledge derived from work experience, as a new form of knowledge that has use value. Discipline as a modality of power appears reconfigured and multiplied in new power-knowledge constellations which aim to subdue the desire and power of know how. Rather than lifelong learning as learning apparatus and strategy in the promotion of a will to learn as has been suggested elsewhere, we offer an alternative account. Here the promotion of a will to learn articulates with the will to knowledge in part through discourses of lifelong learning. Practices of knowledge constitution support the pacification of know how through its reconfiguration as knowledge that can be codified and mobilized for economic innovation. (shrink)

John Field’s Lifelong Learning and the New Educational Order (2000) represents a substantial contribution to the literature on lifelong learning. Whilst Field brings a wealth of policy-related and sociological learning to his work, this article focuses on a number of philosophical questions arising from the study. It is suggested that Field’s argument raises familiar questions about notions of ‘learning’, ‘reflexivity’, ‘personal autonomy’ and the conditions for knowledge. In each case, a number of considerations present (...) themselves which have implications for our understanding of lifelong learning: its nature, prevalence and significance. (shrink)

Citizenship and its education is again gaining importance in many countries. This paper uses England as its primary example to develop a Habermasian perspective on this issue. The statutory requirements for citizenship education in England imply that significant attention be given to the moral and social development of the learner over time, to the active engagement of the learner in community and to the knowledge skills and understanding necessary for political action. This paper sets out a theoretical framework that offers (...) a perspective on learning suitable for these far-reaching aims. We argue that schools need to shift from the currently dominant discourse of accountability to incorporate a discourse of care in order to make room for an effective and appropriate pedagogy for citizenship. Habermas’s social theory gives us a theoretical framework that properly locates schools within the lifeworld as part of civil society. Schools should therefore attend to hermeneutical and emancipatory concerns, not only to strategic interests. We put these in the context of Habermas’s social theory to paint an alternative vision learning for citizenship education which is based in developing the dispositions, values and attitudes necessary for lifelong learning with a view to developing ongoing communicative action. (shrink)

Tactile emotion recognition provides a lot of valuable information in human-computer interaction, and it has strong application prospects in many aspects such as smart home and medical treatment. So this situation raises a question: How to quickly and efficiently let the robot perform the correct emotion recognition? In this work, we develop a lifelong learning algorithm which is based on the efficient dictionary learning technology, to tackle the tactile emotion recognition across different tasks. To verify the efficiency (...) of the proposed method, we applied it to two data sets for experimentation: Corpus of Social Touch (CoST) and our dataset(We built it with a 12X12 array sensor). The results show that the proposed lifelong learning algorithm achieves satisfactory results. (shrink)

Over the last twenty years there has been increasing interest in the work of Michel Foucault in the social sciences and in particular with relation to education. This, the first book to draw on his work to consider lifelong learning, explores the significance of policies and practices of lifelong learning to the wider societies of which they are a part. With a breadth of international contributors and sites of analysis, this book offers insights into such questions (...) as: What are the effects of lifelong learning policies within socio-political systems of governance? What does lifelong learning do to our understanding of ourselves as citizens? How does lifelong learning act in the regulation and re-ordering of what people do? The book suggests that understanding of lifelong learning as contributory to the knowledge economy, globalisation or the new work order may need to be revised if we are to understand its impact more fully. It therefore makes a significant contribution to the study of lifelong learning. (shrink)

The current dominant concept of lifelong learning has arisen from the pressures of globalisation, economic change and the needs of the “knowledge economy”. Its importance is not disputed in this paper. However, its proponents often advocate it in a form which places unrealistic demands on the individual without at the same time addressing their learning needs. The paper suggests that much of lifelong learning in fact amounts to a “pedagogy of the self” whereby individuals are (...) supposed to learn and imbibe certain pedagogic prescriptions so that they adopt a particular identity of the “learner”. The article suggests that this way of looking at lifelong learning misses the point in so far as learning is only as good as the knowledge-in-use which the individual can deploy and for this to happen situational awareness and situational understanding are vital components of lifelong learning. To this end, the article draws attention, by way of an amalgam of certain ideas of Heidegger and Aristotle, to certain structural features of situations which need to be reflected in the curricula of learning programme, the upshot of which is to emphasise both the social and ethical dimensions of lifelong learning. Finally the article suggests that some of the ideas of Stenhouse could be usefully employed in order to suggest not so much a pedagogy of lifelong learning as a pedagogy of critical learning. (shrink)

The aim of this essay is to elaborate on the inner connection between three such diverse entities as lifelong learning, globalization and hermeneutics. After placing lifelong learning in a societal context framed by globalization, my intention is to reflect on the prerequisites for introducing a hermeneutical contribution to the understanding of lifelong learning. First, it is stated that globalization is the most profound horizon today for explaining the current interest we experience in both (...) class='Hi'>lifelong learning and hermeneutics. Second, from these links to on globalization, we can also expect to find new links between lifelong learning and hermeneutics. Third, the predominant configuration of lifelong learning according to the logics of globalization and virtues of flexibility is demonstrated, and thereafter criticized mainly from the perspectives of philosophical anthropology. Finally, an alternative configuration of meaning and identity formation in lifelong learning is proposed by utilizing a reformulated theory of interpretation made possible thanks to recent metamorphosis inside the hermeneutical tradition itself. (shrink)

Concerns about non-participation in lifelong learning may indicate an emerging moral authoritarianism arising from pessimism about the future. Low expectations of potential for social progress, human agency and learners' motivation to take part in formal learning, exacerbate moves towards a 'minimalist pedagogy' regulated by government agencies and encourages the idea that lifelong learning should be compulsory for adults 'at risk'.

It is taken for granted that the complexity of the information society requires a reorientation of our being in the world. Not surprisingly, the call for lifelong learning and permanent education becomes louder and more intense every day. And while there are various worthwhile initiatives, like alphabetisation courses, the article argues that the discourse of lifelong learning contains at least two difficulties. Firstly, the shift from a knowledge‐based to an information society has revealed a concept of (...) learning with an emphasis on skills related to information retrieval, dissemination and evaluation. Learning now is the constant striving for extra competences, and the efficient management of the acquired ones. Secondly, the discourse of lifelong learning suggests the autonomy of the learner. However, educational practices are organized in a way that ‘choosing to learn ’ has become the contemporary human condition. With reference to Marshall's notion of ‘busno‐power’, it is argued that—contrary to what one likes to believe—lifelong learning has become a new kind of power mechanism. (shrink)

Artificial intelligence is again attracting significant attention across all areas of social life. One important sphere of focus is education; many policy makers across the globe view lifelong learning as an essential means to prepare society for an “AI future” and look to AI as a way to “deliver” learning opportunities to meet these needs. AI is a complex social, cultural, and material artifact that is understood and constructed by different stakeholders in varied ways, and these differences (...) have significant social and educational implications that need to be explored. Through analysis of thirty-four in-depth interviews with stakeholders from academia, commerce, and policy, alongside document analysis, we draw on the social construction of technology to illuminate the diverse understandings, perceptions of, and practices around AI. We find three different technological frames emerging from the three social groups and argue that commercial sector practices wield most power. We propose that greater awareness of the differing technical frames, more interactions among a wider set of relevant social groups, and a stronger focus on the kinds of educational outcomes society seeks are needed in order to design AI for learning in ways that facilitate a democratic education for all. (shrink)

This study aims to examine the key barriers to learning to raise achievement of White British pupils with low?income backgrounds. The main findings suggest that the worryingly low?achievement levels of many White working class pupils have been masked by the middle class success in the English school system and government statistics that fail to distinguish the White British ethnic group by social background. The empirical data confirm that one of the biggest groups of underachievers is the White British (...) working class and their outcomes at each key stage are considerably below those achieved by all other ethnic groups. One of the main reasons for pupil underachievement, identified in the case study schools and focus groups, is parental low aspirations of their children?s education and social deprivation. It is also perpetuated by factors such as low?literacy levels, feelings of marginalisation within the community exacerbated by housing allocation, a lack of community and school engagement, low levels of parental engagement and lack of targeted support to break the cycle of poverty and disadvantage, a legacy of low aspiration that prevents pupils from fulfilling their potential across a range of areas. The study concludes that the main obstacle in raising achievement is the government?s failure to recognise that this group has particular needs that are not being met by the school system. The government needs to recognise that the underachievement of White British working class pupils is not only a problem facing educational services but profoundly a serious challenge. Policy implications and recommendations are discussed in the final section. (shrink)

The success of the New Deal policies of the current Labour administration - particularly the Welfare to Work and University for Industry initiatives - will depend crucially on the cooperation of the vital small and medium-sized enterprises sector of British industry. In turn, the reaction of small employers to the new policies will be structured by the national vocational education and training efforts and the vocational qualifications system. Against the background of our recent research on SMEs in the West Midlands (...) region, we argue that the New Deal policies will fail to engage with SME needs and interests unless the new Qualifications and Curriculum Authority effectively abandons the old agenda of the former National Council for Vocational Qualifications in its ongoing restructuring and radical review of issues and policies for VET. (shrink)

This book looks closely at discourses of creativity in the lifelong learning sector from the perspective of a teacher educator. It reworks the idea of creativity for lifelong learning using an analysis of the cinema of Michelangelo Antonioni as a basis. The book argues that ethics and creativity are indissociable and that more relevant practices in teaching, learning and research can be developed from and with them. To do this, the book examines Deleuze's notion of (...) counter-actualization as a form of creative practice and establishes ethical and practical consequences for this diverse sector. (shrink)

Reflective journal writing has been recognized as an effective pedagogical tool for nurturing students’ lifelong learning skills. With the paucity of empirical work on the dimensionality of reflective writing, this research sought to qualitatively analyze students’ RJ writing and design a generic reflection scheme for identifying dimensions of reflective thinking. Drawing on the theoretical scheme, another aim was to design and validate a questionnaire to measure students’ perceptions of their reflective writing experiences. The last aim was to quantitatively (...) measure the link between perceived reflective writing and students’ tendency to use RJs in their future careers and personal lives. This exploratory sequential research included the following steps: First, experts’ review and analysis of 1312 RJ entries were attained. This step led to the design of a theoretical scheme of reflective writing and a 31-item questionnaire, used to gather data from 171 students. Partial Least Squares analysis corroborated the structure suggested by the theoretical scheme: two timelines–reflections regarding the current course assignments and those related to the student’s future development. Students’ tendency to use reflective skills in their future professional lives was highly connected to their long-term reflections, including learning experiences linked to academic, professional, personal, and multicultural development. The current study’s suggested validated generic scheme can be adapted and integrated into different curricula, thereby possibly increasing the potential of infusing RJ instructional strategies into higher education curricula, improving the quality of reflection in student journals, and promoting lifelong learning skills. (shrink)

This book constructs a deepening, interdisciplinary understanding of adult learning and imaginatively reframes its transformative aspects. The authors explore the tension at the heart of current understanding of ‘transformative’ adult learning: that while it can be framed as both easy and imperative, personal transformation is in fact rooted in the context in which we live, our stories and relationships. At its core, transformation is never easy – nor always desirable – and the authors thus draw on interdisciplinary and (...) auto/biographical inquiry to explore what it means to change our presuppositions and frames of meaning that guide our thinking. Using their linguistic, gendered, academic and cultural differences, the authors illuminate how the social, contextual, cultural, cognitive and psychological dimensions of transformation intertwine. In doing so, they emphasise the importance of transformation as a contingent struggle for meaning and recognition, social justice, fraternity, and the pursuit of truth. This engaging book will be of interest to students and scholars of transformative learning and education. (shrink)

This paper addresses the issue of how lifelonglearning, globalisation and capitalism arerelated within late modernity. It is criticalof the argument that there is now anincreasingly homogenous global economy that isknowledge based and that unambiguously requiresa high level of cognitive skills in itsworkers. The idea that globalisation producessuch rapid changes in the world of work thatlearning must be ongoing to cope with it ischallenged.

The article focuses on the problem of development of the lifelong learning skills of senior students in secondary school of general education. The model of interaction between the subjects of learning in the Trello project management system is developed. The foreign literature learning environment in the Trello system is developed. The experience of using the Trello project management system in the process of teaching foreign literature in 10th and 11th grades is described. It has been found (...) that according to the lifelong learning approach a person has to possess skills: goal setting, self-regulation, motivation, time management, self-directed learning, collaboration skills, and self-development. It was pointed out that there are common approaches to project management and educational process management. The use of online systems for collaborative work in the educational process in the secondary school of general education is suggested. Online systems for teamwork that support Kanban methodologies for project management have been analyzed. To confirm the effectiveness of the implementation of the Trello project management system as a tool for the development of lifelong learning skills of senior students, an experiment was conducted: criteria, indicators, levels, and the state of formation of lifelong learning skills of senior students were determined; statistical analysis of the results of the experiment was carried out. The effectiveness of the implementation of the Trello project management system as a tool of the formation of the lifelong learning skills of senior students has been experimentally proven. The study can be applied in educational institutions interested in using agile methods in teaching. (shrink)

What are the values and policies which are driving the development of Further Education institutions? The rapid expansion and development of the post-compulsory sector of education means that further education institutions have to cope with ever-evolving government policies. This book comprehensively examines the current trends in further education by means of both policy analysis and research in the field. It offers an insightful evaluation of FE colleges today, set against the background of New Labour Lifelong Learning initiatives and, (...) in particular, the links between college and community. This timely investigation of FE and New Labour policy, takes a unique community education perspective to determine whether the social objectives of current policy can be achieved by policy-makers, managers, staff and students in FE institutions. For students, lecturers and educators in the post-compulsory sector, in addition to policy-makers and managers, this is an invaluable source of information on a subject which is still largely under-researched. (shrink)

In this article it is argued that there are barriers to effective and non-discriminatory practice when mentoring overseas nurses within the National Health Service (NHS) and the care home sector. These include a lack of awareness about how cultural differences affect mentoring and learning for overseas nurses during their period of supervised practice prior to registration with the UK Nursing and Midwifery Council. These barriers may demonstrate a lack of effective teaching of ethical practice in the context (...) of cultural diversity in health care. This argument is supported by empirical data from a national study. Interviews were undertaken with 93 overseas nurses and 24 national and 13 local managers and mentors from six research sites involving UK health care employers in the NHS and independent sectors in different regions of the UK. The data collected showed that overseas nurses are discriminated against in their learning by poor mentoring practices; equally, from these data, it appears that mentors are ill-equipped by existing mentor preparation programmes to mentor overseas-trained nurses from culturally diverse backgrounds. Recommendations are made for improving mentoring programmes to address mentors’ ability to facilitate learning in a culturally diverse workplace and thereby improve overseas nurses’ experiences of their supervised practice. (shrink)

Digitalization and advanced technologies are replacing human jobs. Around the world, many people have lost their jobs due to increasing digitalization. Similarly, Chinese expatriates associated with the manufacturing sector in emerging countries such as Vietnam face similar challenges. Therefore, Chinese expatriates need to bring competitiveness in their competencies. This competitiveness brings sustainability to their career. The aim of this study is to investigate the impact of career competencies on career sustainability. Moreover, we test the mediating effect of lifelong (...) class='Hi'>learning in the relationship between career competencies and career sustainability. A questionnaire survey approach was used in this study. The target population was the Chinese expatriate managers working at China-invested manufacturing multinational organizations in Vietnam. To estimate the proposed relationships, we use structural equation modeling. The results are confirmed that in the direct relationship career competence has a positive impact on career sustainability. The findings of this study also indicate that career competencies have a positive impact on lifelong learning. Furthermore, outcomes confirmed that lifelong learning has a positive impact on career sustainability. Similarly, results are also confirmed that lifelong learning is positively mediating between career competencies and career sustainability. Therefore, the empirical results of this article identify that lifelong learning has a critical impact on sustainable careers. Specifically, this study is useful for mid-level managers who are associated with multinational organizations. At the end of this article, we also explained the practical implications, limitations, and future research directions. (shrink)

The aim of this article is to investigate the impact neoliberalism has in shaping the discourse of the European Union’s policy of Lifelong Learning. The literature review initially presents the theoretical framework of neoliberalism as the dominant ideological and economic paradigm of our time. Thereafter, it takes a view on how neoliberalism perceives the four objectives of the European Union’s Lifelong Learning policy, namely employability/adaptability, personal fulfillment, social inclusion, and active citizenship. Through the analysis of European (...) Commission’s policy documents on Lifelong Learning, this article explores whether these objectives, with focus on social inclusion and active citizenship, can be realized within the ideological, political, and economic framework set by the neoliberal paradigm. The data underwent Qualitative Analysis using the methods of Critical Discourse Analysis and Qualitative Content Analysis as well as Quantitative Analysis of textual data. The results indicate that only employability and adaptability seem to be compatible with the neoliberal rhetoric since the flexible and adaptable employee better serves the needs of the markets. The role neoliberalism holds for the individual is that of the consumer, product user, and voter. Therefore, the non-economic objectives of Lifelong Learning cannot be equally developed as they constitute the complete antithesis of neoliberalism’s basic principles. (shrink)

Using data from interviews, student work, and classroom observations in a “History of Race” course at a private predominantly White high school, this article examines the racialized tensions that led the teacher (first author) to create an unofficial affinity group for students of color that met outside of class. The authors argue that the teacher's attempt to implement a curriculum that was culturally affirming for students of color by de-centering Whiteness led to White students’ resistance that necessitated the creation of (...) an unofficial “safe space” outside of the classroom for the students of color. The need for such a group demonstrates the difficulties inherent in presenting a more honest account of the role of race and racism in the United States that challenges narratives of historical progress. The article concludes that while students of color ideally should have access to culturally affirming knowledge inside social studies classrooms, this experience demonstrates why that kind of knowledge can only be engaged effectively within learning spaces that challenge the norms of conventional social studies education. (shrink)

UK government policies for social inclusion through engaging with the learning society aim at repositioning people as capable participants in their social worlds. These policies at first sight appear to be aimed at a sophisticated restructuring of social contexts as well as at an enhancing of individual learning. However there is a degree of conceptual confusion within these policies. In this paper we explore some of the tensions evident in a study of a family learning centre in (...) an English city. In the exploration we examine the extent to which the tools offered by sociocultural and activity theory (SAT) can assist in resolving that conceptual confusion and how SAT itself might need to develop in order to analyse complex and sustained forms of intervention. (shrink)

This book declares that lifelong learning teaches values and wholeness and rejects inert ideas or fragmentation. Education plays a vital role in reorganizing and revitalizing the abundant facts from the information explosion. Specialization works at cross-purposes with liberal arts education, which discloses a holistic vision of each person's being.

Background: Few robust autism-specific outcome assessments have been developed specifically for use by teachers in special schools. The Assessment of Barriers to Learning in Education – Autism is a newly developed teacher assessment to identify and show progress in barriers to learning for pupils on the autism spectrum with coexisting intellectual disabilities. Aims: This study aimed to conduct a preliminary validity and reliability evaluation of the ABLE-Autism. Methods and procedures: Forty-eight autistic pupils attending special schools were (...) assessed using the ABLE-Autism. Multi-level modelling was used to evaluate test-retest reliability, internal consistency and convergent validity with the Teacher Autism Progress Scale. Outcomes and results: Results showed excellent test-retest reliability and internal consistency. A large effect size suggested that the ABLE-Autism is strongly correlated with the Teacher Autism Progress Scale. Teacher feedback was positive and suggested that the ABLE-Autism is easily understood by teachers, relevant to autistic pupils in special schools, and adequately covers the skills and behaviours that teachers believe are important to assess for these pupils. Conclusions and implications: Although further validation is recommended, the preliminary evaluation of the ABLE-Autism suggests that it is a useful and has the potential to be an effective outcome assessment for autistic pupils in special schools. (shrink)

The pandemic of COVID-19 has altered the world canvas forever. The education sector, too, has been impacted by the same. There has been a phenomenal rise in e-platforms for teaching, learning, and evaluation. Teachers and students had to train themselves overnight to embrace the changing dynamics of the education sector. The change has been marked with challenges. In this new education landscape, online exams have occupied center stage. While the idea of giving exams from any part of the world (...) welcomes freedom, it also raises concerns among faculty and students about academic integrity. Thus, as online studies and online assessment continue to expand, the paper aims to identify the factors responsible for unethical practices in online assessment. The paper further identifies the association between the identified factors. The paper proposes a four-level model that focuses on the lack of training for both faculty and students, interpersonal barriers, technological barriers, time management, personal ethics, and design of assessment as underlying reasons for unethical behavior in online assessments. The paper further explains the linkages using fuzzy MICMAC analysis. The results have both practical and social implications. Understanding the factors and their relationship with each other can help the instructors and administrators in their decision-making process regarding online evaluations and formulate policies that would instill strong ethical values, such as academic integrity and honesty, in their students throughout their academic journey. (shrink)

This exploratory paper considers the concept of generation in the context of learning across the life course. Although researchers have often found considerable inequalities in participation by age, as well as strongly articulated attitudinal differences, there have so far been only a handful of studies that have explored these patterns through the perspective of generational formations. The paper is primarily conceptual, exploratory and reflective, setting out a number of approaches to the concept of generations, most of which derive largely (...) from debates with the ghost of Karl Mannheim; it then considers how these concepts of generation have been applied to understandings of educational inequalities in recent research in Germany and the Nordic nations. It then examines the dynamics of inter-generational relations in learning, drawing on research undertaken as part of the Teaching and Learning Research Programme. The paper argues that although inter-generational dynamics are a relatively neglected dimension of Anglophone research on life chances and learning, there is a strong case for understanding their dual roles in both inequality and cohesion. It concludes by outlining some themes and areas for further investigation in the future. (shrink)

As adults age, their performance on many psychometric tests changes systematically, a finding that is widely taken to reveal that cognitive information-processing capacities decline across adulthood. Contrary to this, we suggest that older adults'; changing performance reflects memory search demands, which escalate as experience grows. A series of simulations show how the performance patterns observed across adulthood emerge naturally in learning models as they acquire knowledge. The simulations correctly identify greater variation in the cognitive performance of older adults, and (...) successfully predict that older adults will show greater sensitivity to fine-grained differences in the properties of test stimuli than younger adults. Our results indicate that older adults'; performance on cognitive tests reflects the predictable consequences of learning on information-processing, and not cognitive decline. We consider the implications of this for our scientific and cultural understanding of aging. (shrink)

College English teaching aims to cultivate students' comprehensive ability to use English. The study of spoken English barriers is a hot topic in this subject area. Based on a survey of non-English primary college students' spoken language impairments, this paper analyzes the research status of spoken language impairments at home and abroad. It relies upon the theoretical basis of Swain's output and Krashen's input hypotheses. With extensive data mining in colleges and universities as the entry point, this paper's content, (...) object, and method are determined by combining qualitative and quantitative research with empirical research. Through the combination of classroom observations, questionnaires, interviews, and other research forms, this paper concludes that the spoken language barriers of non-English primary college students include language and non-language barriers. The influencing factors of the spoken language output barriers include subjective and objective aspects. The questionnaires are analyzed from the three dimensions of the students, schools, and education departments. This paper proposes some ways to overcome the spoken English barriers of non-English college students. It also suggests that non-English college teachers should pay more attention to the cultural transmission of English-speaking countries in English classes, cultivate students' cross-cultural awareness, and enhance students' enthusiasm in English learning. These actions are more conducive to overcoming the psychological barriers in spoken English output. (shrink)

Change is one of the central aims of professional development for information and communication technologies integration in education. Studies on the use of ICT in education highlights the large investments in infrastructure and professional development, and the limited results in students learning. Teachers’ professional development for ICT integration in education has evolved from the development of technical skills to pedagogical skills and content-related knowledge. The gold standard and design-based approaches have dominated TDP-ICT. This study presents the Change Laboratory method (...) as a formative intervention to motivate teachers to identify and overcome the barriers to ICT integration. The results showed that a professional development intervention based on CL stimulates transformative agency in the participants. Six forms of transformative agency, namely resisting, criticizing, explicating, envisioning, committing to actions, and taking actions, were found during the CL. The transformative agency was essential to motivate teachers to identify and propose a model solution to overcome both first-order and second-order contextual barriers. (shrink)

Bilingualism is a valuable tool that enriches and facilitates cultural, social and lived experiences for autistic and non-autistic people alike. Research consistently finds no negative effects of bilingualism and highlights the potential for positive effects across cognitive and socio-cultural domains for autistic and non-autistic children. Yet parents of autistic children remain concerned that bilingualism will cause delays in both cognitive and language development and are still frequently advised by practitioners to raise their child monolingually. Evidently, findings from research are not (...) reflected in practice or subsequent advice, and it is essential to identify ways to ensure equal access to additional language learning. We briefly summarise the existing literature on bilingualism and autism, considering perspectives from the bilingual autistic community, and experimental research. We identify the most pertinent barriers to participation for autistic bilingual children in terms of familial, clinical and educational perspectives. We propose novel solutions to promote additional language learning and suggest changes to practice that will contribute to an evidence base for families and practitioners. This commentary makes innovative recommendations at both the individual and societal level to ensure that autistic bilingual people have equal rights and opportunities to language learning and are optimally supported in accessing them. (shrink)

The discovery of a stable latent reservoir for HIV‐1 in resting memory CD4+ T cells provides a mechanism for lifelong persistence of HIV‐1. The long‐lived latently infected cells persist in spite of prolonged highly active antiretroviral therapy and present a major barrier to a cure of HIV‐1 infection. In this review, we discuss the current understanding of HIV‐1 persistence and latent viral infection in the context of effective antiretroviral therapy and the recent progress in purging latent viral reservoirs. Recent (...) studies demonstrate that reactivation of latent HIV‐1 is a promising strategy for the depletion of these viral reservoirs. A thorough evaluation of the anti‐latency activity of drug candidates should include the measurement of changes in intracellular viral RNA, plasma virus levels, and the size of latent viral reservoirs, as well as potential adverse effects. Currently, there are several technical barriers to the evaluation of anti‐latency drugs in vivo. We also discuss these challenging issues that remain unresolved. (shrink)

Studies of education and careers in science, technology, engineering, and math commonly use a pipeline metaphor to conceptualize forward movement and persistence. However, the “STEM pipeline” carries implicit assumptions regarding length, contents, and perceived purpose. Using the National Survey of College Graduates, we empirically measure each of these dimensions. First, we show that a majority of STEM workers report skills training throughout their careers, suggesting no clear demarcation between education and work. Second, we show that using on-the-job expertise requirements paints (...) a very different portrait of the STEM workforce—and persistence in it. Third, we show that STEM-educated workers are well-prepared for but dissatisfied with non-STEM jobs, complicating our understanding of leaving. Collectively, these results recommend expanded conceptions of STEM education and careers and contribute to studies of science and engineering workforce transitions and diversity. (shrink)

In the paper, several data reduction techniques for machine learning from big datasets are discussed and evaluated. The discussed approach focuses on combining several techniques including stacking, rotation, and data reduction aimed at improving the performance of the machine classification. Stacking is seen as the technique allowing to take advantage of the multiple classification models. The rotation-based techniques are used to increase the heterogeneity of the stacking ensembles. Data reduction makes it possible to classify instances belonging to big datasets. (...) We propose to use an agent-based population learning algorithm for data reduction in the feature and instance dimensions. For diversification of the classifier ensembles within the rotation also, alternatively, principal component analysis and independent component analysis are used. The research question addressed in the paper is formulated as follows: does the performance of a classifier using the reduced dataset be improved by integrating the data reduction mechanism with the rotation-based technique and the stacking? (shrink)

The concept of lifelong education received wide criticism and rejection in many educational circles in the 1970s. Recent developments in educational research and the increasing influence of postmodernist thought, the paper argues, are major factors in the return to favour of lifelong education. While a postmodern society is one characterised more by conflict than by consensus, the paper suggests that consensus on the importance of lifelong education might be one precondition for such a society.