Web 2.0 technologies for 21st century learning: Creating conditions for sustaining change in institutions of higher education

In the last decade, views of learning have dramatically changed. These changes, especially thosebrought about by the advent of Web 2.0 social learning technologies, are having a profound effect on formal learning, in particular in institutions of higher learning. In this paper, we report on how three such institutions in three diverse locations - Europe, North America and South America, are responding to these pressures. Initial sections of the paper focus on an emerging definition of 21st Century learning culture based on social learning theories and the use of Web 2.0 technologies and what this means for institutions of higher learning from a pedagogical and organizational perspective. The paper then traces the various new Web 2.0 technologies that have been introduced at these three institutions, including the results of two doctoral studies projects involving video-based web conferencing. The next section explains the roles and responsibilities of the various stakeholders in implementingthese changes. From a critical perspective, the implications of when, what, why and how Web 2.0 technologies are employed in terms of learners, learning and sustained change, are outlined. In the lattersection, recommendations are provided and suggested future directions are identified as a means of calling attention to the emerging issues that need to be faced as paradigms shift, and increasingly, technologicallymediated interactions alter the ways learning is taking place.