This paper discusses some instructional design principles used in a First Year Computer Science unit to create a new form of learning environment online, which focuses on authentic student learning by re-orienting the instructional paradigm to reflect what recent research has shown about the learning process. We believe that assisting students to become constructive learners will encourage our students to take increased responsibility for their own learning and that ultimately our students would be able to participate meaningfully in a networked, knowledge-based economy of the 21st century. In this way, our students will be better prepared for life in a postmodern, postindustrial world which requires of them to engage in a lifetime of learning for enhanced personal development and to facilitate for themselves flexible career paths.