clipped from members.optusnet.com.au

the priorities for a PLE are different for a tertiary student, a university administrator, an instructor, a working professional, or an adult who persues an eclectic path of lifelong learning. Metaphorically, an individual may engage in a learning process that is either more acquisitional or participatory

a Personal Learning Environment is a facility for an individual to access, aggregate, configure and manipulate digital artefacts of their ongoing learning experiences.

PLEs are effectively controlled by the individual, thus decoupled from institutional portals like university Virtual Learning Environments (VLE) or workplace Learning Management Systems (LMS) for which the design goals are in response to institutional requirements.

A PLE integrates with the digital services to which the individual currently subscribes. These could be the university VLE, the workplace LMS or a collection of so-called Web 2.0 services like social bookmarking or photo sharing.