The pervasive influence of culture should be regarded as a significant conc
ern in the design of technology-enhanced learning systems, In fact, it has
been included as one of the five essential foundations of effective student
-centred learning environments (Chen and Mashhadi, 1998), The other foundat
ions are psychological, pedagogical, technological, and pragmatic. This art
icle will focus mainly on the cultural and pedagogical considerations in th
e design of student-centred learning systems with particular reference to t
hree cases in Singapore. The experiences will illustrate some of the challe
nges and problems in designing and implementing learning systems in three d
ifferent contexts: local-institutional, trans-institutional, and global. So
me of the instructional design issues include those articulated by Collins
(1997) in his consideration for building a constructivist learning environm
ent. They are related to learning goals such as thoughtfulness vs memorizat
ion, whole tasks vs component skills tasks, breadth vs depth of knowledge,
diverse vs uniform expertise.