About This Issue

One of the articles in Transforming Education (IC#18)
Originally published in Winter 1988 on page 1
Copyright (c)1988, 1997 by Context Institute

There is a major shift brewing in education.

This issue is the story of that shift, both its basis and its prospects.

Like the rest of society, education is being pushed by the growing demands and opportunities of a global information society. Yet education has its own special impetus for change as well. Over the past few decades, basic research on human development has gradually built a wonderful and complex understanding of how we humans actually learn. More recently, during the past 10 years or so, educational techniques based on this research have been gradually accumulating and maturing, like quietly ripening fruit, and they are now ready to move into broad implementation.

Yet the time has not yet come for celebration. We are still only on the threshold. The door is open before us, but it is up to us to choose to go through it. Will we realize how significant this opportunity is and will we have the courage and persistence that will be needed to overcome all kinds of institutional resistance?

We offer this issue in the hope that it will help you in your choosing.

We are fortunate to have as our guest editors for this issue Dee Dickinson and Linda MacRae-Campbell. Through New Horizons for Learning (for which Dee is coordinator and Linda is a board member), they have been major catalysts in the process of moving basic research into educational practice. We are happy to use this issue to contribute to that work.