Pontydysgu

Personal Learning Environment (PLE) – as an idea, approach and concept – has demonstrated the potential to support a learner-centred digital learning ecosystem that is diverse, individualised, adaptive, integrated, transparent and skill-based. In a PLE, the locus of control shifts away from the institution to individuals, to the agency of individuals, helping them take control of their learning and build a personal cyberinfrastructure and learning ecosystem that extends learning beyond the classroom, institution, or organisation’s boundaries using distributed and portable tools. In the current conditions, understanding what a PLE is and reshaping educational systems to relocate PLE is more importanat tan ever; as well as to refocus the importance of reshaping learning and prioritizing people's agency in the current technological and social conditions. This special issue was conceived as an effort to collectively explore the pathways and challenges of adopting the PLE as a legitimate approach for self-education and lifelong learning and engaging in contextual change. The papers finally included on it, have a variety of perspectives, including - theoretical reflections, conceptual analysis, literature reviews, learning and teaching experiences – from the learners’ point of view and from the instructors’ point of view, as well as tools for improving student experiences, systemic projects to confront PLE challenges, and first approaches to research paths that explore other aspects of the implementation of the PLE. In addition, this issue brings together a number of authors, nationalities and data sources that broaden our view of the object of study and can enrich the discourse. Los Entornos Personales de Aprendizaje (PLE), como idea, enfoque y concepto, han demostrado su potencial para apoyar un ecosistema de aprendizaje digital centrado en el alumno, diverso, individualizado, adaptable, integrado, transparente y basado en las competencias. En un PLE, el lugar de control se desplaza de la institución a los individuos, a la agencia de los individuos, ayudándoles a tomar el control de su aprendizaje y a construir una ciberinfraestructura personal y un ecosistema de aprendizaje que extienda el aprendizaje más allá de los límites del aula, la institución o la organización utilizando herramientas distribuidas y portátiles. En las condiciones actuales, comprender qué es un PLE y remodelar los sistemas educativos para reubicar los PLE en el centro de ellos es más importante que nunca. Se trata de revalorizar la importancia del PLE de las personas en las condiciones tecnológicas y sociales actuales. Eso implica reestructurar la enseñanza y el aprendizaje, dando verdadera prioridad a la agencia de las personas. Este número especial se concibió como un esfuerzo para explorar colectivamente las vías y los retos de la adopción del PLE como enfoque legítimo para la autoeducación y el aprendizaje permanente y para participar en el cambio contextual. Los trabajos finalmente incluidos en él, tienen una variedad de perspectivas, incluyendo - reflexiones teóricas, análisis conceptuales, revisiones de literatura, experiencias de aprendizaje y enseñanza - desde el punto de vista de los aprendices y desde el punto de vista de los instructores, así como herramientas para mejorar las experiencias de los estudiantes, proyectos sistémicos para afrontar los retos del PLE, y primeras aproximaciones a vías de investigación que exploran otros aspectos de la implementación del PLE. Además, este número reúne una serie de autores, nacionalidades y fuentes de datos que amplían nuestra visión del objeto de estudio y pueden enriquecer el discurso.

In a changing world of work with high youth unemployment rates, an ageing society and flexible work force, practitioners in Public Employment Services need to cope with continually growing demands. In this paper we present the EmployID project which introduced a blended learning approach for Public Employment Services in Croatia, designed to support professional identity transformation through peer facilitation and learning. The evaluation shows that learners benefited from higher knowledge and skills development related to peer coaching, along with an increase in activities related to collaborative, reflective learning.

Sporting news has brought doctors’ roles under the spotlight in recent weeks. Cath Janes looks at the ethics of working in the “win at all costs” environment

This paper presents two independent case studies selected from n = 11, an 11-year-old male with Down's Syndrome and another 12-year-old male with Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD). An audiovisual immersive interactive environment was developed to encourage creative interaction and expression from the participants. The feedback was via a microphone attached to a sound processor to capture any vocal utterances or speech, additionally the child's gestures were captured through a digital camera and mapped to computer vision algorithms to create a ‘moving painting’, and then further to a MIDI sound source that responded to the movements of the child. Results indicated increased engagement spans whilst in the environment, atypical communicative responses in the case of the ASD child; highly expressive gestural movements that vividly illustrated aspects of the theory of movement as postulated by Laban (1963) and Laban and Lawrence (1974); and increased vocal utterances.

Sadly, I have to agree with the survey by the Hospital Caterers Association (analysis October 10). I know many nurses who see patient mealtimes as an opportunity to take their own break.

We have little control over who we work with. Cath Janes explains how to live with irritating colleagues and give your career a kick while you are at it

Recently I read the article on why we love to nurse (features June 30), which was morale boosting. I fully support the Nursing the Future campaign to enhance the image and reputation of nursing and midwifery.

The paper explains and compares a range of approaches to the solution of the container-ship stowage problem, which focuses on the reliable production of valid, sub-optimal solutions. These include the strong decomposition of the problem into different conceptual levels of planning to which branch h bound, Tabu search techniques and Genetic algorithms have been applied. A particular focus lies on the relationships between the methods of solution and the corresponding models of cargo and stowage spaces, and the consequences that these models have for the accuracy and usefulness of the solutions produced.

The following books are reviewed. Women and Gender in Early Modern Wales MICHAEL ROBERTS & SIMONE CLARKE (Eds), 2000 Cardiff: University of Wales Press. 320 pp., ISBN 0 7083 1550 X, paperback, £14.99; 0 7083 1580 1, hardback, £35.00 Women in Scotland c. 1100–c. 1750 ELIZABETH EWEN & MAUREEN M. MEIKLE (Eds), 1999 East Linton: Tuckwell Press. 282 pp., ISBN 0 86232 046 2, £14.99 Gendering Scottish History: an international approach TERRY BROTHERSTONE, DEBORAH SIMONTON & OONAGH WALSH (Eds), 1999 Glasgow: Cruithne Press. xxi + 280 pp., ISBN 1 873448 18 X, hardback, £20.00; 1 873448 16 3, paperback, £10.95 Women, Sexuality and War PHILOMENA GOODMAN New York: Palgrave. xii + 164 pp., ISBN 0 333 76086 7, £42.50 Revealing New Worlds: three Victorian women naturalists SUZANNE LE-MAY SHEFFIELD, 2001 London: Routledge. ISBN 0 415 2706 9, hardback, £65.00 ‘Wicked’ Women and the Reconfiguration of Gender in Africa Dorothy L. Hodgson & Sheryl A. McCurdy, 2001 Oxford: James Currey. xiii + 325 pp., ISBN 0 85255 695 0, hardback, £40.00; 0 85255 654 4, paperback, £16.95 ‘I Will Not Eat Stone’: a women's history of colonial Asante Jean Allman & Victoria Tashjian, 2000 Oxford: James Currey. xlvi + 255 pp., ISBN 0 85255 691 8, hardback, £40.00; 0 85255 641 1, paperback, £15.95 ‘We Women Worked So Hard’: gender, urbanization and social reproduction in colonial Harare, Zimbabwe, 1930–56 TERESA A. BARNES, 1999 Oxford: James Currey. xlv + 204 pp., ISBN 0 85255 686 1, hardback, £40.00; 0 85255 636 5, paperback, £16.95 Women and Modernity in Weimar Germany: reality and representation in popular fiction VIBEKE RÜTZOU PETERSEN, 2001 Oxford: Berghahn Books. xvi + 184 pp., ISBN 1 57181 154 0, hardback, £20.00; 1 57181 789 1, paperback, £13.95 The Irish Women's History Reader ALAN HAYES & DIANE URQUHART (Eds), 2001 London: Routledge. xi + 242 pp., ISBN 0 415 19914 X The Routledge Historical Atlas of Women in America SANDRA OPDYCKE, 2000 New York: Routledge. 144 pp., ISBN 0 415 92138 4, £10.99 What American Women Did, 1789–1920 LINDA MILES COPPENS, 2001 Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Company. ix + 259 pp., ISBN 0 7864 0899 5, £36.60 Favorite Dishes: a Columbian autograph souvenir cookery book CARRIE V. SHUMAN (Ed.), 2001 (reprinted from an 1893 edition) Champaign: University of Illinois Press. lxiii + 210 pp., hardback, $29.95; paperback, $15.00 Feminist Freikorps: the British voluntary women police, 1914–40 R.M. DOUGLAS, 1999 Westport: Praeger. xiv + 171 pp., ISBN 0 275 96249 0, hardback, US$58/£48.95