Personal Relevance Work is personally relevant when it stems from and is related to the learner's life, interests, and experiences. Personally relevant work may be a written assignment that allows the student to express and defend a position on an issue of importance. It may involve the application of content in a context that holds personal meaning. For example, a student in a farming community may apply genetic concepts in a context within which he or she is already knowledgeable and comfortable, such as animal husbandry. Professional Relevance Work is professionally relevant when it includes problems that cause the learner to use processes and strategies that closely resemble those which a professional might use.
Technology can be a powerful support for professionally relevant work in several important ways.
Technology can provide students with access to firsthand information resources, often the same data and resources that are used by professionals in the field of study. Technology can provide opportunities for interactions between students and professionals in the field. Many of the tools used by professionals are technology-based. Societal Relevance Work has societal relevance when it takes place in the context of a problem that is important to an audience within a larger community and includes some level of communication with that audience. For the younger learner, this audience may be within the school community, even within their own classroom.