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The proliferation of social media, new generations of digital natives and the profusion of wireless campuses promise to revolutionise teaching and learning in the twenty-first century. No consensus exists on how to introduce Web 2.0 technologies into an educational context, so whilst it is intuitive that educators have a vital role in determining and evaluating the uses and implications of social media, there is a lack of research both into general pedagogic questions and into the particulars of introducing blogs to the classroom. The potential for blogging in education is explored through a review of international research, exemplars of good practice are cited and a qualitative case study of the integration of social media across a range of college level courses is presented. Vignettes from the case study illustrate both the successes enjoyed and the difficulties encountered introducing individual and group blogs. The majority of students endorse the use of blogs and report how blogs support their learning by codifying search trails, improving writing styles, help the visualisation of the process of their own and classmates’ work, how group blogs facilitate the coordination of collaborative projects and how for many blogging has become an integral part of their educational experience.

As industries are increasingly globalized, our students’ future workplaces require facility with cross-cultural collaboration, yet curricula often remain situated within the home culture. This chapter presents a qualitative case study on a collaborative project between students in London, Hong Kong, and Singapore. An overview of the process is given drawing on the experiences of the teachers and students involved, informing a discussion around the issues inherent in the internationalization of the curriculum. Tutors created a shared private Facebook group to connect London College of Fashion students with students at City University Hong Kong and LASALLE College of the Arts Singapore. Students worked on separate but aligned briefs that mirror contemporary working patterns and allowed co-creation of educational experiences beyond the geographic and time constraints of working internationally, specifically addressing issues around global and local communications. The Facebook platform was used separately and collaboratively to support students’ learning and the digitally mediated collaboration allowed for flexibility in when and how education took place, providing a third space for co-creation of learning: a global classroom.

The chapters in this book focus on how university-school partnerships can be used to foster academic and program development. The introductory chapter is oriented around three key questions: How do we define innovative international university partnerships? Do these innovative international university partnerships really work? What factors contribute to the success of these collaborations? In addressing these questions, this chapter presents a framework that addresses a taxonomy for innovative programs, elements to develop partnerships, ideas for sustaining collaboration, and challenges that might surface during implementation. In this volume a range of perspectives is presented using case studies and empirical research on how university partnerships are being implemented internationally. These findings suggest that university partnerships have great potential to enhance and even transform colleges and universities.

This chapter provides a broad overview of the practical applications of three technology-based teaching and learning tool: wikis, blogs, and WebQuests. These Web-based communication tools allow teachers and students to increase student engagement by enhancing experiential type learning. A variety of studies is presented to demonstrate how these three types of collaborative technologies can be used as inquiry-based and reflection-based active learning tools to foster higher levels of effort and participation by students. This chapter presents a variety of perspectives about how to make the learning process for both instructors and teachers more engaging, more gratifying, and more personally meaningful. In doing so, these technologies serve as enabling technologies by promising new ways to increase academic engagement and motivation. The ultimate goal in using these technologies is to develop students as lifelong learners and to foster a high value for learning and the development of higher order thinking skills that grows over time. The experiential nature and authenticity of the activities that these technologies can be used for helps achieve this purpose. Of course, technology involves a constant evolution and new technologies will always appear in the future but this does not mean that they should be viewed as passing fads or not worthy of implementing. These tools can be viewed as opportunities to expand our definition and concept of teaching and learning in the modern, post-industrial era. To that end, this chapter explores the innovative use of these technological tools to better engage students and enhance the learning process.