Introduction

This introductory chapter sets out the basic question for the book: How can the implications of a situated knowledge view be developed into learning designs aimed at knowledge transformation? This question is motivated by the following basic conundrum: in contemporary society, people are required to traverse a range of different settings with different competence demands, and they often have to utilise knowledge across these different settings. However, research within the field of education and learning has shown that knowledge is learned situatedly, i.e., it takes on form and content from the context in which it is learned. The chapter presents the societal and academic background for discussing knowledge transfer. It summarises the findings of the book in four sections, corresponding to the four parts of the book: Conceptualisation of knowledge transformation (focusing on the theoretical development of relevant concepts), Empirical processes of knowledge transformation (presenting empirical investigation of transformation of knowledge), Developing design principles (presenting methodological and design-theoretical aspects of developing pragmatically useful design principles) and Findings from design experiments (presenting the results of three design-based research studies).