ABSTRACT
Is pedagogy in different cultures around the world substantially different or has globalization resulted in a blending of beliefs about what is best in teaching and learning and can this educational practice become universal? There are numerous concerns about the globalization of education through e-learning and programmes taught at a distance. Although there are very few programmes that have the extensive global reach of the subject of this chapter, the Cisco Networking Academy Program, there are many other programmes in the education and training arena that are developed in one country and taught in others. The Academy Program has become a meeting point for an international community of teachers to collaborate on teaching the same vocational programme effectively in their own cultures. From a recent internal evaluation in Europe, the Middle East and Africa it has become clear that the responsibility for making this programme culturally and pedagogically relevant lies in the hands of local instructors and in the support mechanisms available to them to share good practice from around the world. This chapter indicates the ways in which local instructors have supported students’ studying the programme, describing good and not so good practices with digital media. It examines the factors that support or inhibit students’ learning and the assumptions that are made. It then draws conclusions about the necessity for, and nature of, local support for an education programme that is developed in one country and delivered in another.
