Interdisciplinary and Context. Twentieth-century education often focused on learning the content and broader disciplines as separate — distinct both from one another and from the context in which that learning naturally occurs in
the real world. Learning in the 21st century focuses on the exploration of authentic, real-world, and relevant topics, issues, and problems in the contexts in which they occur. Learning should not be thought of as memorizing subject-specific facts and concepts in a vacuum, but rather as cross-disciplinary and in real-world contexts. A system that privileges learning in connection with the social state of affairs in which it occurs is known as situated learning. Two of its early proponents argue that learning is a social process and that teachers and learners participate in the co-construction of knowledge. As such, education should be experienced in an appropriate social and physical environment. For example, learners might wonder how they could create more storage in their classroom. They would do research on types of storage, develop plans, and build storage units. Their learning would be cross-disciplinary — they would use research skills to conduct searches, group discussions to come up with ideas, and math and engineering skills to design and build their storage unit.