Challenging E-learning in the University: A Literacies Perspective

"This book offers a radical rethinking of e-learning … The authors challenge teachers, course developers, and policy makers to see e-learning environments as textual practices, rooted deeply in the social and intellectual life of academic disciplines. This approach holds great promise for moving e-learning past its focus on technology and 'the learner' toward vital engagement with fields of inquiry through texts."
Professor David Russell, Iowa State University

Challenging e-learning in the University takes a new approach to the growing field of e-learning in higher education. In it, the authors argue that in order to develop e-learning in the university we need to understand the texts and practices that are involved in learning and teaching using online and web-based technologies.

The book develops an approach which draws together social and cultural approaches to literacies, learning and technologies, illustrating these in practice through the exploration of case studies.

It is key reading for educational developers who are concerned with the promises offered, but rarely delivered, with each new iteration of learning with technologies. It will also be of interest to literacies researchers and to HE policy makers and managers who wish to understand the contexts of e-learning.

Mary R. Lea is a senior lecturer in the Institute of Educational Technology, Open University, UK. She has researched and published widely in the field of academic literacies and learning, with a particular focus on implications for practice. She is co-author with Phyllis Creme of Writing at University: A Guide for Students (Open University Press, 2003).