Abstract

The use of technology has revolutionized education. Online teaching and learning and their flexibility in terms of place, time, and pace of study contribute to the “new curriculum.” Curricula will continue to become more “blended” combining e-learning with traditional formats (face-to-face lectures and other modes). A key challenge for ourselves as educators is to adapt the institutions in which we work to meet the emerging reality of the connected environment. Employers require fewer but more skilled workers. The cognitive skills fostered by education should be those of problem solving that enables individuals to process information effectively and work within complex, ever-changing environments.Today the questions that should be asked about schooling are those that take into account the social context in which we live. As educators and administrators we need to attend to the world outside of the closed context of the “system” and recognize the ways in which the world has become interrelated with the understanding that every student comes into the classroom with a biography and a way of being in the world. For today’s learners that world has increasingly become a wired one with the need for social interaction.