This book offers a challenge to traditional approaches to classroom teaching and pedagogy. The SPRinG (Social Pedagogic Research into Groupwork) project, part of a larger research programme on teaching and learning funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), was developed to enhance the learning potential of pupils working in classroom groups by actively involving teachers in a programme designed to raise levels of group work during typical classroom learning activities.

Changing student profiles and the increasing availability of mainstream and specialized learning technologies are stretching the traditional face-to-face models of teaching and learning in higher education. Institutions, too, are facing far-reaching systemic changes which are placing strains on existing resources and physical infrastructure and calling into question traditional ways of teaching through lectures and tutorials.

Integrating all aspects of the fields of metacognition and learning technologies, this book describes features of the learning technologies and how they have been designed to study and support metacognitive processing and self-regulated learning.

As digital devices play a more critical role in daily life than ever, more opportunities arise for innovative learning technologies—a trend on full display in the Educational Media and Technology Yearbook for 2012. This latest edition, volume 37, from the Association for Education, Communication, and Technology (AECT) notes the most current trends in the field of learning design and technology, taking into account the implications for both formal and informal learning.

The Internet and associated technologies have been around for almost twenty years. Networked access and computer ownership are now the norm. There is a plethora of technologies that can be used to support learning, offering different ways in which learners can communicate with each other and their tutors, and providing them with access to interactive, multimedia content. However, these generic skills don’t necessarily translate seamlessly to an academic learning context.