Facilitating the development of multicultural learning communities through Authentic e-Learning

In the rapidly globalizing 21st century knowledge society, multicultural understanding plays a major role. However, what do we mean by 1Cculture 1D in the educational context, what aspects actually have or should have an impact on our learning environments, and might some of these assumptions direct the development of our learning environments in an undesired way? New learning models that differ from traditional learning approaches might cause a type of a 1Clearning culture shock 1D for some learners. What are the best ways to avoid and overcome cultural clashes in online learning? This paper discusses the experiences from two multicultural and multidisciplinary online programs for teacher education. Both of the programs are based on the principles of authentic e-learning framework as described by Herrington, Reeves and Oliver (2010). The aim of the study was to find out how learners with different cultural backgrounds experience the authentic e- learning process, as well as to find out what impact the authentic e-learning model has on the development of the learning culture