"While changes related to cultural diversity are visible and at work in social, cultural and political contexts, cultural diversity as such is being ignored or rejected across many countries. It is the denial or hidden nature of diversity in educational settings and learning processes, reflected in the marginalisation of this topic, that this book wants to address. The book chapters are blind peer reviewed and draw from a variety of learning settings across the world. They are intended to open up spaces to talk, promote and struggle for the relevance of addressing learning diversities. This includes current and new directions for theoretical and methodological discussions. They concern spaces of interaction and diversity research across single and multiple moments, different contexts and various time scales. They also explore the diversity of theories used to address these issues and how we theorize the relationship between centres and margins in understanding the idea of opening spaces for dialogue."

This publication includes the Proceedings of the PLE Conference 2013. The Conference on Personal Learning Environments is now an established annual international, scientific event and a reference point for the current state of the art in research and development in Personal Learning Environments (PLE). The PLE Conference creates a space for researchers and practitioners to share concepts, case studies and research related to the design, development and implementation of Personal Learning Environments in diverse educational contexts including formal and informal education. The 4th PLE Conference in 2013 took place at Beuth University of Applied Sciences in Berlin, Germany together with a parallel event at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia. The PLE Conference 2013 received 75 submissions and welcomed almost 100 delegates from Europe, Asia, Australasia, North and South America and Africa.The papers included in the Proceedings provide rich and valuable theoretical and empirical insights into Personal Learning Environments. Personal Learning Environments (PLE) is an approach in Technology-Enhanced Learning (TEL) based on the principles of learner autonomy, ownership and empowerment. PLEs are integrated, individual environments for learning which include specific technologies, methods, tools, contents, communities and services constituting complex learning infrastructures, enhancing new educational practices and at the same time emerging from these new practices. This represents a shift away from the traditional model of technology-enhanced learning based on knowledge transfer towards a model based on knowledge construction and sharing.

It is clearly illogical to search for one good, universal solution for multilingual education when educational contexts differ so widely due to demographic and social factors. The situation is further complicated by the motivations of learners and teachers, and by attitudes towards multilingualism and ‘otherness’. The studies in this volume seek to investigate not only whether certain solutions and practices are ‘good’, but also when and for whom they make sense. The book covers a wide range of Western multilingual contexts, and uncovers common themes and practices, shared aims and preoccupations, and often similar solutions, within seemingly diverse contexts. In addition to chapters based on empirical data, this book offers theoretical contributions in the shape of a discussion of the appropriateness of L1-Ln terminology when discussing complex multilingual realities, and looks at how the age factor works in classroom settings.

The four-volume set LNCS 6765-6768 constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 6th International Conference on Universal Access in Human-Computer Interaction, UAHCI 2011, held as Part of HCI International 2011, in Orlando, FL, USA, in July 2011, jointly with 10 other conferences addressing the latest research and development efforts and highlighting the human aspects of design and use of computing systems. The 70 revised papers included in the second volume were carefully reviewed and selected from numerous submissions. The papers are organized in the following topical sections: user models, personas and virtual humans; older people in the information society; designing for users diversity; cultural and emotional aspects; and eye tracking, gestures and brain interfaces.

This open access handbook offers a one-stop-shop for both new and established researchers, educators, policy makers and administrators in the field of open, distance and digital education (ODDE) to gain a comprehensive overview of the history, theory and practice at all levels of ODDE, and at the same time stimulates in-depth discussions on various themes and issues of ODDE for today and future. Researchers, scholars and students in the field of ODDE can use this handbook as a major reference to conduct their own research and learning agendas. To cover the field comprehensively, the handbook is structured following the 3M framework developed by one of the chief editors Zawacki-Richter. The 3M framework categorizes the major research areas and issues in ODDE on three levels. Accordingly, the handbook is divided into six sections in total, two section at each of the three levels: 1) Macro Level – ODDE Systems and Theories, 2) Meso Level - Institutional Perspectives, Management and Organization, and 3) Micro Level – Learning and Teaching in ODDE. This is an open access book.

In many countries, particularly in the Global North, established forms of solidarity within communities are said to be challenged by the increasing ethnic and cultural diversity of the population. Against the backdrop of renewed geopolitical tensions – which inflate and exploit ethno-cultural, rather than political-economic cleavages – concerns are raised that ethnic and cultural diversity challenge both the formal mechanisms of redistribution and informal acts of charity, reciprocity and support which underpin common notions of community. This book focuses on the innovative forms of solidarity that develop around the joint appropriation and the envisaged common future of specific places. Drawing on examples from schools, streets, community centres, workplaces, churches, housing projects and sporting projects, it provides an alternative research agenda from the 'loss of community' narrative. It reflects on the different spatiotemporal frames in which solidarities are nurtured, the connections forged between solidarity and citizenship, and the role of interventions by professionals to nurture solidarity in diversity. This timely and original work will be essential reading for those working in human geography, sociology, ethnic studies, social work, urban studies, political studies and cultural studies.

In addition to many other issues that touch higher education around the world, diversity and equity in higher education is fast becoming a major opportunity and challenge to institutions, countries and regions. The increasing centrality of diversity is fueled in part by changing demographics, immigration, social movements, calls for remedies to historic grievances, and the relationship between identity and access to power. This book will provide an opportunity to look at efforts at institutional change with respect to diversity in several countries where issues of diversity are moving beyond simply access for diverse populations to efforts at institutional transformation. Its purpose is to provide a comparative perspective with the hope that we will be able to see patterns across these contexts from which we might learn. Amongst other subjects it will address: The historic and contemporary context for diversity Established and emerging salient identities How diversity is framed at a national and institutional level The prevailing strategies and policies for engaging diversity, again at the national and institutional level The role of special purpose institutions This critical book is essential for higher education scholars and practitioners with backgrounds in higher education.

Many contemporary commentators present a damning account of the current state of higher education, to the extent that our universities may be considered to be broken. This book offers an alternative perspective to the dominant neoliberal discourse and provides the conceptual tools to help construct a trajectory of repair for our universities. These ideas are presented within this book as five moves to transform our current pathological situation and develop towards a more healthy and sustainable ecological learning environment. In this book, Ian Kinchin draws upon a wide range of sources from the philosophy of education, biological and clinical sciences as well as educational research and academic development. This alternative ecology of ideas presents a challenge to university leaders and asks if we care enough about the future of our universities to encourage an evolution of practice that deals sustainably with the wicked problems our universities face in the coming century. It describes a move towards an ecological university. The book includes a foreword written by Martyn Kingsbury, Professor of Higher Education and Director of the Centre for Higher Education Research and Scholarship, Imperial College London, UK.

This book presents an interdisciplinary approach to the study of affectivity and human learning by bridging the gap between neuroscience, cultural and cognitive psychology. It brings together studies that go beyond the focus on cognitive-intellectual variables involved in learning processes and incorporate the study of the role played by affectivity and emotions in learning not only at educational settings but in all processes of transformation and human development, thus presenting affectivity as a catalyst and mediator of all daily learning processes. Chapters brought together in this contributed volume present both theoretical contributions and results of empirical research from different disciplines, such as neuroscience, cognitive psychology, cultural psychology, educational psychology, developmental psychology and philosophy, and are grouped into five thematic sections. The first part of the book brings together chapters discussing different aspects of the role played by affectivity in learning processes from the perspectives of cultural, educational and developmental psychology. The second part is dedicated to the role of affectivity for teachers during their training as educators and during their pedagogical practice in diverse contexts. The third part focuses on the relationship between affectivity and learning from a neuroscientific point of view. The fourth part discusses affectivity and learning in therapeutic and clinical contexts. Finally, the fifth part brings together chapters about affectivity and learning in everyday life. By bringing together this rich interdisciplinary collection of studies, Affectivity and Learning: Bridging the Gap Between Neurosciences, Cultural and Cognitive Psychology will be a valuable resource for researchers in the fields of psychology, neuroscience and education, as well as for educators and teachers interested in knowing more about the relationship between affectivity and human learning.