A new education for a new digital age?

Abstract

These are exciting yet uncertain times in which to be studying education and technology, with rapid developments in digital media entwined with contemporary education change. In particular, growing numbers of writers and researchers are portraying the emergence of so-called ‘web 2.0’ internet technologies in transformatory terms. There has been much discussion, for instance, of a general recasting of education provision along more fluid and democratic lines. Some commentators have heralded the emergence of an ‘Education 2.0’ built around the re-engagement and empowerment of learners (Fumero 2006, Rosenfeld 2007). Yet these enthusiasms are tempered by pessimistic predictions of heightened dis-engagement and disconnection of learners from their studies, or else an imminent decline in ‘traditional’ skills and literacies amongst upcoming generations of digitally dependent young people (Brabazon 2007). Education researchers are therefore left facing a long-standing question - i.e. can the changes associated with this new wave of education innovation be said to be enhancing or harming learners and the forms of learning in which they are engaged?