King 1Web 2.0 and EducationLiterature Review of Tools & Technologies to Enhance EducationBy: Brian J. KingBowling Green State Universitykingbri@bgsu.edu

King 2IntroductionTo understand the role of web 2.0 and how it is altering the education of today’s learners itis essential to understand the role of what is known as web 1.0. According to Hastings (CEO of

Netflix) “

Web 1.0 was dial-up, 50K average bandwidth, Web 2.0 is an average 1 megabit of bandwidth and Web 3.0 will be 10 megabits of bandwidth, which will be the full video Web, andthat will feel like Web 3.0” (Web 1.0). According to Flew in his book

New Media

edition) hedescribes the differences in web 1.0 versus web 2.0 “move from personal websites to blogs and blog site aggregation, from publishing to participation, from web content as the outcome of largeup-front investment to an ongoing an interactive process, and from content management systemsto links based on tagging (folksonomy)” (Web 1.0). O’Reily of O’Reily Publishing coined theterm Web 2.0 at the first Web 2.0 conference in 2004 as “Web 2.0 is the business revolution inthe computer industry caused by the move to the Internet as a platform, and an attempt tounderstand the rules for success on that new platform” (Web 2.0

With these new advances intechnology and design principles for creating social and participatory applications we mustacknowledge the need of Prensky’s digital natives that have grown up with technologicaladvancements and playing online games, using social networks, etc. Prensky also asserts “Weneed to invent Digital Native methodologies for

all

subjects, at

all

levels, using our students toguide us” (Prensky). The technologies have been altered as well as the wiring of neural networksin Digital Natives; for our education system to continue to flourish we must invent ways of engaging these learners with the newest technologies that best match their learning styles. Net-Generation Learners & Their LearningPrensky stated that “today’s students are no longer the people our educational system wasdesigned to teach” (Prensky 2001). Today’s learners that are involved in K-16 level education aremembers referred to as Millennials or the net generation. Coyle states (as part of research fromHowe and Strauss, 2000) that there are several important attributes of millennials and that pointto a need for a new approach to learning from and teaching to/with these millennails:

Will be referred to as LMS or LMS’s throughout the rest of this document.

King 3“Collaborative learning is popular with millenials, increasing computer use among all teens andthe use of beepers and cell phones suggest Millennials spend time tracking down andcommunicating with friends and family, Millennials appear more teamlike, Millenial teens arehard at work on a grossroots reconstruction of community, teamwork, and civic spirit, and lastlyMillenials are adept at high tech research skills and using this research in real life” (Coyle,Originally found in Howe and Strauss (2000). A gap between the educators and those to beeducated exists today and needs to be changed to meet the needs of Prensky’s digital natives.“Today’s students are ‘native speakers’ of the digital language of computers, video games, andthe Internet. They process information and act differently than previous generations. Digitalimmigrants have had to adopt; their ‘accents’ are discernible” (Prensky 2001). To meet the needsof this entire generation of Millenials the education system must be re-tooled and a paradigmshift in our education system is imminent or our education system will be educating these peopleusing pedagogies that are just not made for how this Millenial digital native group speaks andlearns.Paradigm ShiftTapscott notes that education is traditionally oriented with learning models with the focus being on the instruction; where the term

teacher

has the implication that the teacher transmits or broadcasts information to students. Content experts develop and design the curriculum (assumedto be the teacher) and give one-way broadcast type messages to be lectured, read, or in someother way assigned to the student. The Internet and other new media forms empowers andcenters the learning experience on the individual learner as opposed to those broadcasting it (theteacher), this centers the learning on the student and allows them to create rich individualizedlearning experiences. (Tapscott, mff.org). Ficek a Computer Science professor at Minnesota StateUniversity Moorhead states that “While Learning Management Systems like WebCT andBlackboard are course-centered and largely faculty-driven, Ficek says PLE’s

are largely learner-centered and have four key features: communication and collaboration, formal and informal