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The rise of globalisation makes language competencies more valuable, both at individual and societal levels. This book examines the links between globalisation and the way we teach and learn languages. It begins by asking why some individuals are more successful than others at learning non-native languages, and why some education systems, or countries, are more successful than others at teaching languages.

The book comprises chapters by different authors on the subject of language learning. There are chapters on the role of motivation; the way that languages, cultures and identities are interconnected; the insights that neuroscience provides; migrants, their education and opportunities to learn languages; language learning and teaching in North America; and new approaches to language learning.

This is the latest of the influential series of OECD reports on Innovative Learning Environments. “Learning leadership” is fundamental because it is about setting direction, taking responsibility for putting learning at the centre and keeping it there. This becomes increasingly complex in 21st century settings, calling for innovation and going beyond the heroics of individual leaders. Many need to be involved, bringing in diverse partners at different levels.

This is all explored in this volume. It clarifies the concepts and the dimensions of learning leadership, relating it to extensive international research and identifying promising strategies to promote it. Specific examples are drawn from Austria, Australia, Canada, Israel, Norway, Singapore, Spain, the United Kingdom and the United States. There is an extensive overview that addresses the “why, what, how, who, where, and when” of learning leadership. Among the international experts contributing to this volume are James Spillane, John MacBeath, Louise Stoll, and Clive Dimmock.

This report will prove to be a valuable resource for all those interested in schooling. It will be of particular interest to teachers and teacher educators, advisors and researchers, the voluntary sector and teacher associations, and, first and foremost, education leaders themselves.

People from many countries have expressed interest in the tests students take for the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA). Learning Mathematics for Life examines the link between the PISA test requirements and student performance. It focuses specifically on the proportions of students who answer questions correctly across a range of difficulty. The questions are classified by content, competencies, context and format, and the connections between these and student performance are then analysed.

This analysis has been carried out in an effort to link PISA results to curricular programmes and structures in participating countries and economies. Results from the student assessment reflect differences in country performance in terms of the test questions. These findings are important for curriculum planners, policy makers and in particular teachers – especially mathematics teachers of intermediate and lower secondary school classes.

Leaders and academics can improve the quality of higher education teaching, and thereby the quality of their graduates, by reflecting on institution-wide practices. This book explores the interplay between actors within institutions, organisational structure, commitment of senior leadership, involvement of faculty and students, and evaluation instruments.

Based on an OECD review of 46 quality teaching initiatives in 20 countries, the report highlights the significant impact of the institutions’ environment, trends in the quality of academia, teaching methods and learning conditions. The sample represents 29 higher education institutions, from technological and vocational institutions to business and economic schools, from small undergraduate institutions to multidisciplinary postgraduate universities. 

The book illustrates the following factors with examples from around the world:

• the aims of institutions when fostering quality teaching, their options and the guiding philosophy behind a quality approach;
• concrete ways to apply quality teaching initiatives, challenges to implementing them, and key actors in their dissemination;
• evaluation systems and the impacts of institutional support on teaching, research and quality culture;
• how institution-wide approaches can be combined to enhance quality teaching in a sustainable way.

The book also analyses the effects of quality teaching on institutional leaders, faculty members, quality units and students.

This report focuses on the development of reading proficiency during the transition from adolescence to early adulthood. The span of time between the ages of 15 and 24 is a critical period of development for young people. Once compulsory education is completed, individual decisions about post-secondary education, employment and other life choices have to be made with major consequences for future learning and employment outcomes. A good foundation in reading proficiency facilitates success in specialised education during higher education or during job-related training. Since reading proficiency is not the goal of such specialised or professional learning, reading skills may begin to atrophy. So both learning gains and losses need to be considered as human capital is developed.  

Canada’s investments in PISA, as well as in longitudinal data and reassessment of reading proficiency, provides insights into the importance of individual reading proficiency and later outcomes, such as educational attainment, further learning, employment and earnings. Therefore, this report makes a vital contribution to the understanding of learning gains between the ages of 15 and 24 and their impact on such outcomes, and provides a basis for evidence-based policy and strategic investments by the community of countries participating in PISA

This report presents the first internationally comparable results to OECD's 2003 Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) Survey of the educational performance of 15-year-olds in reading, mathematics, and science in 25 OECD countries.  This year, the concentration was on mathematics. Beyond the examination of the relative standing of countries in mathematics, science and reading, the report also looks at a wider range of educational outcomes that include students’ motivation to learn, their beliefs about themselves, and their learning strategies. Furthermore, it examines how performance varies between the genders and between socio-economic groups; and it provides insights into some of the factors that influence the development of knowledge and skills at home and at school, how these factors interact and what the implications are for policy development.  Most importantly, the report sheds light on countries that succeed in achieving high performance standards while, at the same time, providing an equitable distribution of learning opportunities.

The report presents a wealth of indicators showing how countries compare in various measures of educational performance and factors that affect that performance.

Across the OECD, attention is focusing increasingly on what has been dubbed the "digital divide" - a term that refers to the gaps in access to information and communication technology (ICT). The stakes are high, as ICT is now integral to the social fabric and is the catalyst for "new economies" to emerge. Exclusion threatens the ICT "have-nots", whether individuals, groups or entire countries. Political awareness of the stakes at issue grows sharply, as indicated by the prominence of the digital divide in G-8 discussions.

Education and learning lie at the heart of these issues and their solutions. They are the lifeblood of our 21st century knowledge societies, and ICT is critical to them. The gaps that define the "learning digital divide" are thus as important as the more obvious gaps in access to the technology itself. Learning is central in the still more fundamental sense that the machines and equipment are useless without the competence to exploit them. Nurturing this competence is in part the job of schools and colleges, in part dependent on the learning that takes place throughout life in homes, communities, and workplaces.

This volume meets an important need in the contemporary international literature on education policy, lifelong learning, and economic and social development. It presents analysis of the "learning digital divide" in different countries - developed and developing - and the policies and specific innovations designed to bridge it. The evidence shows that ICT can be the solution to inequalities rather than their cause - digital diversity and opportunity rather than digital divide.

Enormous investments are being made in computers and Internet connectivity for schools. The aim is to provide high-quality learning and teaching and equip young people for the knowledge society. But how are the benefits of this educational investment to be realised? It calls for much more than installing the hardware, and is not simply a matter of using ICT to do traditional things in different ways. Schools have to learn to change and to change to new ways of learning.

There is an urgent need for quality software and digital materials for use in schools. Teachers - and students - must become discerning and knowledgeable ICT users. The school environment has to be fully supportive of ICT, making available expert assistance and advice to the teacher in this rapidly-changing field. New forms of curriculum and assessment are called for, new ways of organising schools, if the dramatic educational potential of ICT is to be delivered and realised.

Such a demanding "learning to change" agenda is the subject of this international report. It is illuminated by the views of individual students, who used ICT enthusiastically in their own learning, and shared their experiences in an OECD international network. The report looks at the vast educational possibilities arising from the Internet, bringing together the school, the home and the wider community. It examines how ICT, which is the subject of teacher professional development, can largely be the means for its delivery. There are numerous examples of promising practice and principles for the future.

In OECD countries, the number of cities and regions which put learning, education, research and innovation at the heart of their development strategies is rapidly increasing and bringing together governments, the private sector and society. The growing interest in learning cities and regions reflects the fundamental shifts which are taking place. Cities are becoming more knowledge-based and organised as never before around learning and human skills. Today, these factors are central not only to individual success but also to gaining national, regional and urban economic advantage. Comparative advantage is increasingly dependent on human resources, knowledge creation, and continuous, incremental innovation rather than on access to physical capital and raw materials.

This book presents different approaches to regional development based on knowledge and innovation in Andalusia, Spain (and some other countries). Potential applications to areas similar to Andalusia are also given. The study contains a synthesis of the presentations and discussions of the conference held in Malaga, Spain, on the 30th September and 1st October 1999, that focused on the current situation of the region, analysing its evolution over the last twenty years, and evaluating the policies already implemented in the region. A diagnosis of the present socio-economic system has been made in order to measure the applicability of policies that would help Andalusia to develop into a learning region, built on human, social, cultural and "synergetic" capital.

For decades Japan has remained at or near the top of international assessments of student learning; and in the past decade, students in Japan have become more engaged in learning. However, the government aspires to improve learning outcomes even further. Strong Performers and Successful Reformers in Education: Lessons from PISA for Japan focuses on how Japan is reforming its education system not only to produce better learning outcomes, but to equip students with the skills they need to navigate through the unpredictable labour market of the future and to participate in society as active citizens.

This is the second in a series of reports examining how education systems are handling the challenge of preparing their students for a world of interconnected populations, rapid technological change, and instantaneous availability of vast amounts of information. Like the first volume, Strong Performers and Successful Reformers in Education: Lessons from PISA for the United States, this report presents examples from other countries with consistently high-performing education systems or countries that, by redesigning policies and practices, have been able to improve their education outcomes, as measured by the OECD Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), the world’s most comprehensive and rigorous survey of students’ skills and attitudes towards learning.