ABSTRACT
This chapter addresses the affordances of Web 2.0 technology. Today’s students enter the classroom with technology skills developed from as early as age three. The use of Web 2.0 tools allows students to exercise new modes of inquiry, develop contemporary digital literacies, amplify their voices, and demonstrate transformed learning. One purpose of this chapter is to define Web 2.0 and ways the internet has changed from strictly information retrieval to information and social interaction. Web 2.0 tools influence student behavior both in and out of the classroom. A second purpose of the chapter is to describe changing competencies that align with 21st-century literacy skills. Referred to as the 4 Cs, the competencies include critical thinking, collaboration, creativity, and communication. The 4 Cs in classroom practice provide details and examples of how these skills are reinforced with technology. When framed from a multiliteracies perspective, Web 2.0 tools, and UDL practices prompt teachers to think about student access to content through planning. Just as curricular planning needs to consider the 4 Cs, inclusive practices need to include UDL’s three principles of representation, action and expression, and engagement.
