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This publication is aimed at practitioners and managers in colleges of further education [FE] and parallel settings in the learning and skills sector. It arises from a partnership between the Learning and Skills Development Agency (LSDA) and the research project Transforming Learning Cultures in Further Education (TLC) funded within Phase 2 of the Economic and Social Research Council's (ESRC) Teaching and Learning Research Programme (TLRP). The project started in 2001 and will run until 2005. It has three main aims: it seeks to deepen understanding of the complexities of learning; to identify, implement and evaluate strategies for the improvement of learning opportunities; and to set in place an enhanced and lasting capacity among practitioners for enquiry into FE practice. This report offers a 'collage' of insight and experience pertaining to all three of these aims. It starts by giving an outline of the project and its approach and then covers: experiences of being involved in the project, and the way that reflection on practice has been enabled, enhanced and harnessed; the development of understanding of learning and its transformation via case-study work on particular 'sites' and through comparisons between them; cross-project insights and the approaches and tools being developed to arrive at them, including the proposal of six principles for good learning and teaching, derived from project data and analysis; and accounts of 'interventions', where practitioners have consciously sought to change some aspect of their practice and monitored the results. The report ends on a note of cautious optimism with regard to the potential for engagement in research to improve practice in colleges of further education and similar settings.