PurposeTo acquire academic literacy students need library buildings that take account of “what the student does”, changing learning styles and preparation for employment in a digital world. Equally as academic staff develop innovative e‐learning activities, library spaces need to accommodate new learning opportunities. This paper aims to consider how the design of library buildings contributes to a complex and evolving range of academic literacies and emerging pedagogical frameworks. The paper also seeks to consider the contribution these literacies make to the experience of students reading for a degree in an increasingly digital environment.Design/methodology/approachThe paper draws on the experience at Bournemouth University, where a higher education academy‐funded project accelerated the introduction of new technologies into learning and teaching frameworks. A new library building, The Sir Michael Cobham Library, enabled the creation of learning spaces that are flexible and responsive to the changing needs of users.FindingsInnovative spaces and evolving pedagogies demand different levels of academic literacy to enable students to succeed in physical and digital environments.Originality/valueThis reflective review adds new dimensions to the body of knowledge underpinning both the study of learning spaces and academic literacy.

Collaboration between Librarians and Learning Technologists at Bournemouth University (BU) has been stimulated and cemented by Pathfinder funding from the Higher Education Academy. This paper will consider four case studies collected as part of the eRes Project that describe the use of Web 2.0 technologies in the School of Health and Social Care at BU. The project aimed to enhance the student learning experience in an increasingly electronic environment. This was achieved by developing and disseminating innovative pedagogical frameworks, bringing together learning activities and academically led quality e-resources within the unit of study. An e-reading strategy which encompasses models for resource discovery and e-literacy was developed, drawing on the experiences and findings of the case studies. Issues considered in this paper will include accessing academic electronic reading materials and using a social bookmarking tool integrated within BU's virtual learning environment with students studying away from the main campus. Additionally the paper will consider how technology can be used to motivate students, especially in large groups and how it can be used to engage students with a subject perceived as "dry" or "difficult". The rich possibilities of health science materials can be exploited more fully using new technologies embedded within the curriculum.

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Designs for change and the drivers of change This chapter explores macro influences on change and the key drivers of that change. There are also many micro influences, more pragmatic in many ways: the impact of eye line on the ability of a class to collaborate; the design contrast between individual task orientated learning and more open ended collaborative learning (for example furniture layout in assessment scenarios); the impact of the timetable on what is achievable (work with cBBC confirmed that that producing good quality, media rich work with children typically requires whole day-long blocks of time); the impact of repellant toilets on fluid consumption and thus on consequent concentration levels; the inflexibility of laboratory furniture (for example the inability to harness drama based activity to reinforce science concepts) and more. These micro influences are embedded elsewhere in the report, below. This chapter primarily explores the vectors of change, but a meta level reflection here should be that the velocity of change is significantly accelerating. This pace of change, above all else, provides the primary driver, and need, for change in the design of learning spaces. Social drivers Just as mobility changes diminished the power of the extended family, so information and communication changes are regenerating distributed social relationships in companies, families and in learning. Current educational political trends as documented by DfES 1 and NCSL 2 are towards "networked