Brains working towards machine consciousness

We all live within an environment.  Part of that is obviously our physical environment, but the bit I am writing about is our learning environment.  Looking at what each of us, as an individual, uses to support our learning gives rise to the concept of a Personal Learning Environment, or PLE.  The term PLE, however, is typically used with regard to the technological toolset an individual uses, rather than the sum of all factors in the learner's environment.

The internet provides many resources and many distractions. Of the resources, some are higher quality than others. A learner, seeking understanding, is in a similar position to a ship's captain - aiming to reach a certain goal, but without necessarily having accurate charts to plot the route, weather forecasts to predict disturbances to their route, and possibly without much idea of how the rudder works, or from where they are starting.