Lifelong Learning
Patricia Cross' 1981 book, Adults as learners described three features of lifelong learning:
- A more holistic concept of growth or education than that which has been used in traditional formal education.
- A wider view of providers of and settings for education than merely schools (what she terms the learning society).
- The active agency or self-directedness of the learner throughout the life span.
Distance education has created a major shift in how educators and students think about teaching and learning. By allowing students to learn in locations and times that are more convenient, distance education opens educational opportunity to previously unreachable populations. It also enables more people to extend the period of their education from a limited number of schooling years to a lifelong learning process.
Lifelong learning is closely related to adult learning.