Research
We explore how adult education can be made inclusive, digital and effective.
Services
Digital tools, specialist portals and data – for teachers, researchers, students and interested parties.
Institute
We offer research, transfer and infrastructure for lifelong learning.
The report outlines the 50-year history of the statistics on adult education centres published by the German Institute of Adult Education and its predecessors since 1962. The chronology of events is depicted in a chart, whereas the tool‘s various characteristics, which generated key problems since the beginning and still do until today, are discussed in the text. The author fathoms future chances and challenges of input-oriented institutional statistics in a time with a tendency towards output …
“Bildung” and Biography in Self-organized Learning If subjects of learning are related to the learners thinking and acting in past or future, learning gains a biographic dimension. The notion of “bildung” can be attributed to a learning process, when frames of interpretation get transformed and re-arranged. The councelling of learning in a learning environment opens spaces, where learning processes like this can come true. This interrelation is examined in the contribution with an analysis o…
As empirical studies have shown, the Germans’ knowledge of financial affairs is rather poor. Basic knowledge on banking and insurance is often absent, even though it is essential in times when provision for a safe future increasingly becomes everyone’s personal responsibility. Even if relevant content were taught at schools comprehensively and from this moment on, today’s adults would still remain ignorant. Therefore, a tremendous task lies ahead for adult education to provide relevant knowledg…
This third edition of the DIE Portrait Continuing Education in Germany has been extensively revised to include up-to-date figures on such key areas of continuing education as numbers of courses offered, participants, institutions and staff employed. The volume also outlines the history of German adult education and provides information on its basis in law and funding matters. Educational researchers, planners, administrators and practitioners, will thus obtain a thorough insight into the conti…
Gender skills for adult education Gender mainstreaming is a central maxim for political action all across Europe. However, little effect is yet to be felt in adult education. Where there is gender-sensitive adult education, this is still strongly oriented towards the differential approach. In view of participation rates in general and vocational adult education, and the division of interests within the segments, which is again gendered, the author speaks of a “doubly divided structure”. For …
Competence Assessment in Working with the Disabled. Experiences Gathered in Franz Sales House in Essen The report focuses on the challenges of implementing a system for competence assessment in the Franz Sales House in Essen – a social institution for the disabled. The authors point out methods for the competence assessment of employees in a social institution to adjust them to future requirements and use them as a base for an effective management of educational processes. Experiences gathered…
Based on the currently observable »generation change« in organizations of adult and continuing education, the text deals with conflicts between different generations and age groups, which may arise from this special situation of transition. Different forms of conflicts and tensions are outlined with regard to selected findings from studies of business and adult educational research on organizations. Above all organizations of adult and continuing education are confronted with the dilemma of con…
In this article we explore the challenges of learning in later life, in particular intergenerational or cross generational learning for the future. Looking to the policy of the European Union (EU), in particular to lifelong learning, we see how the notion for intergenerational and intercultural learning has been embedded more and more into policy. The question is if this makes sense, or better: how will it make sense? Senior education is transforming in intergenerational learning – intergenerat…
The author looks at two forms of learning in virtual environments: learning with hypermedia and learning by confrontation with virtual objects and „persons“ (simulations). For hypermedia, research has found a rather wide discrepancy between media-specific learning potential and actual outcome, which, especially for beginners, tends to be rather small. - Many empirical studies on learning in simulated reality have shown that simulations can indeed be conducive to learning, but that this is not a…
This article sheds light on cooperation between different educational fields as seen from the point of view of experts in education. The authors present the initial findings from the group discussions of a DFG project which started recently. These findings cast doubt on whether cooperation can succeed when different occupational groups know so little about one another within and outside their educational sectors. It remains to be seen whether future data expected from the project confirms the c…
