ABSTRACT
A key element of lifelong learning as discourse is the notion of flexibility which we discuss in Chapter 1. Flexibility of provision includes, meeting students’ needs at times and places, and at a pace of their own (or their employers’) choosing. The availability of open and distance learning opportunities based on the use of information and communications technologies (ICTs) has been heralded as being especially important in achieving this flexibility. The growing use of ICT in teaching and learning means that long-sstanding assumptions about the relationship between time, place and learning are breaking down. ICT means that not only learners do not have to attend a particular place, they also do not have to learn at particular times or in particular ways. Courses can be taken in the home, in the workplace or at any location remote from a learning provider, who could be next door or in another continent (or both since increasingly different institutions are collaborating in providing courses collaboratively1). For the advocates of ICT, these approaches represent a movement in the locus of control from teacher and institution to the learner, who through the flexibility of new technology can make self-directed learning a reality. Futhermore, it has been argued that the connectivity that the Internet brings also increases individuals’ stock of social capital, both of a bonding and a bridging form.2 It brings individuals together with those they know, but creates bridges to others, and aids the development of socially sustainable communities (see Timms, 2007).
