This ground-breaking book, now available in paperback for the first time, looks at the theory and practice of learning and how universities can improve their quality and competence.

Classroom Discourse and the Space of Learning is about learning in schools and the central role of language in learning. The investigations of learning it reports are based on two premises: First, whatever you are trying to learn there are certain necessary conditions for succeeding - although you cannot be sure that learning will take place when those conditions are met, you can be sure that no learning will occur if they are not. The limits of what is possible to learn is what the authors call the space of learning. Second, language plays a central role in learning - it does not merely...

Necessary Conditions of Learning presents a research approach (phenomenography) and a theory (the variation theory of learning) introduced and developed by Ference Marton and taken up by his wide and varied following around the world-together with their practical applications in educational contexts. Reflecting Marton's whole lifetime's work, the unique and significant contribution of this book is to offer an evidence-based answer to the questions "How do we make novel meanings our own?" and "How do we learn to see things in more powerful ways?"

The presentation makes use...