About a month ago I said I was writing about Digital Natives and Digital Immigrants (Digital Natives: Fact Or Fiction?). This was the start of the writing project that caused me to put my life on hold (We interupt this service...) but as I said (Normal service will now be resumed...) I got there and thought it was time I told you some of what I found.
When I first heard the Digital Native/Digital Immigrant idea I was really taken with it. It has been criticised (quite rightly) as being an inadequate, incomplete or even misleading description of what can be observed but you have to remember that it is a metaphor. When the phrase “Digital Native” is introduced, almost immediately the hearer will start to make connections with examples from their own experience. However, like all metaphors, it can break down when asked to support too many concepts. As a shorthand for introducing ideas such as the technology rich world in which young people live it works. As a way of stimulating debate on educational issues related to teaching technically proficient students, it has been very useful. However, to use it to extrapolate that everyone born after a certain date is a competent and confident user of technology is probably pushing the metaphor past breaking point. Where the metaphor is used to make less confident young people feel inadequate or to provide an excuse for the disinclined (see Jenkins), the metaphor has ceased to be useful.
Therefore, as I said, I wanted to look for evidence of Digital Natives in the PGDE(S) cohorts of student teachers. However, I expected from Rebecca Eynon's presentation at CAL 2009 that other factors would be important in predicting student attitudes to and uses of technology. Specifically at age, previous experience and breadth of use.
When I analysed the results, I wasn't surprised that experience and breadth of use were important but I was surprised at how unimportant age seemed to be. In fact on a couple of occasions, the older students expressed more Digital Native like opinions than the younger students. I hope to formally publish the findings elsewhere, so I'll just mention a couple of the things that surprised me just now.
It appeared that older students enjoyed learning to use a computer more than younger students. This seems counter intuitive since it might be expected that digital immigrants would dislike having to learn how to use new technology and resent the difficulty and effort that they have to put in to do what Digital Natives are supposed to be able to do without effort. Part of the explanation however may be that it is a non-issue for younger students. Do children "enjoy" learning to walk or is this just something they do and what they enjoy is the increased mobility and independence walking brings? Perhaps learning to use a computer is something younger students just do and what they enjoy is what this allows them to achieve.
I was also surprised by how many younger students' experience of technology seemed to coincide with the start of their undergraduate degree. There were 24 of the youngest group of students (12%) who had four years or fewer of experience with using computers. While this is not a huge number of students, it shows that we should not assume all young people are familiar with computers and confident in their use of technology. Perhaps it also says something about the use of ICT in secondary schools that so many could have come through school education apparently untouched by technology.
There's much more of note but I think that will do for now. :-)
Showing posts with label Digital Native. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Digital Native. Show all posts
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Saturday, March 28, 2009
CAL 2009: Digital natives
Captured live at #cal09, posted late.
Digital natives: Who are they and what do they look like?
Rebecca Eynon*, Ellen Helsper University of Oxford (Oxford Internet Institute)
What factors may describe a digital native? Is there an age factor.
If it is true that younger people work and learn in different ways, this has implications for education. Important to see how young people are using technology in their daily lives. There is some research that shows a higher proportion of young people use the Internet but are there significant differences in the way young people use new technology?
Research based on Oxford Internet Survey - the 2007 survey is based on responses from over 2000 people. General characteristics of digital natives were described. {But I missed the chance to copy them down! Curses. - DM}. Some aspects of the survey results show that age is a factor. For example, 14-17 year olds are the highest users of the Internet and are more likely to be surrounded by technology. When asked how skilled they are at using the internet, again, 14-17 year olds are more likely to say they are skilled. First port of call for information - again, 14-17 most likely to go to the Internet for more tasks. Multi-tasking by age also shows 14-17 as highest. However, there is not the dramatic drop that Prensky might suggest after 25. Main significant drop happens after 55.
Digital nativeness - age is an indicator, but so are other factors such as previous experience.
Activities online - shopping is the most common. Middle age group more likely to shop and do e-government type activities. Formal learning, fact checking and current affairs may also be age dependent. Age is important but many other factors are important too.
Younger people do tend to have access to a greater range if ICT, more likely to go to Internet for information online and more likely to multi task. However education, experience of using the Internet and breadth of Internet use are important. There is therefore some support of the digital native concept but age is not the only factor. In other ords, parents and teachers can learn to speak to digital natives. For example, online experiences need to be contextualised and this is an area where teachers could help.
Digital natives: Who are they and what do they look like?
Rebecca Eynon*, Ellen Helsper University of Oxford (Oxford Internet Institute)
What factors may describe a digital native? Is there an age factor.If it is true that younger people work and learn in different ways, this has implications for education. Important to see how young people are using technology in their daily lives. There is some research that shows a higher proportion of young people use the Internet but are there significant differences in the way young people use new technology?
Research based on Oxford Internet Survey - the 2007 survey is based on responses from over 2000 people. General characteristics of digital natives were described. {But I missed the chance to copy them down! Curses. - DM}. Some aspects of the survey results show that age is a factor. For example, 14-17 year olds are the highest users of the Internet and are more likely to be surrounded by technology. When asked how skilled they are at using the internet, again, 14-17 year olds are more likely to say they are skilled. First port of call for information - again, 14-17 most likely to go to the Internet for more tasks. Multi-tasking by age also shows 14-17 as highest. However, there is not the dramatic drop that Prensky might suggest after 25. Main significant drop happens after 55.
Digital nativeness - age is an indicator, but so are other factors such as previous experience.
Activities online - shopping is the most common. Middle age group more likely to shop and do e-government type activities. Formal learning, fact checking and current affairs may also be age dependent. Age is important but many other factors are important too.
Younger people do tend to have access to a greater range if ICT, more likely to go to Internet for information online and more likely to multi task. However education, experience of using the Internet and breadth of Internet use are important. There is therefore some support of the digital native concept but age is not the only factor. In other ords, parents and teachers can learn to speak to digital natives. For example, online experiences need to be contextualised and this is an area where teachers could help.
Thursday, March 26, 2009
CAL 2009: The Net Generation
Captured live at #cal09, posted late.
The Net Generation entering university: The experiences of first year students
C.R. Jones*, R Ramanau: Open University
See The Net Generation Encountering eLearning at University Project for more details.
Started by challenging the whole concept of the Net Generation. Is there a generation with a new outlook on learning and if there is, how does this show itself?
Focus in this presentation was to look at five different types of universities and a range of subject disciplines concentrating on first year students.
Figures showed 38.1% own desktop but 77.4% own a laptop. Broadband access 55.6% only but 13.4% had wireless mobile connection (interesting because this is a new technology but already reasonably high take up).
They also look at differences between use for life and use for study. There are a small minority who never or rarely use email. Also, there is a very low use of virtual worlds - the educational use of virtual worlds is not being driven by the young people. Roughly 50% are using SMS for learning.
They are not a generation! There is no consistency and often low take up. For example, 21.5% contributed to a blog, 12.1% contributed to a wiki. There is no coherent effect.
In general use exceeds requirements to use but students are also unclear about what is required!
If they are using tools for social life and leisure, they are more likely to use in learning. There are some age differences but their are also big differences within age groups. However there are some age related differences. For example over 50% of younger people who download documents read them on screen. There is however a moral panic, see for example Baroness Greenfield's comments on Facebook. {See Bad Science for an excellent citique of the Baroness' comments. - DM}
Questions raised the wifi access finding and pointed out the rise of pay as you go services and links with broadband connections may mean this is reaching into groups that it would normally not have considered wifi connections.
The Net Generation entering university: The experiences of first year students
C.R. Jones*, R Ramanau: Open University
See The Net Generation Encountering eLearning at University Project for more details.
Started by challenging the whole concept of the Net Generation. Is there a generation with a new outlook on learning and if there is, how does this show itself?
Focus in this presentation was to look at five different types of universities and a range of subject disciplines concentrating on first year students.Figures showed 38.1% own desktop but 77.4% own a laptop. Broadband access 55.6% only but 13.4% had wireless mobile connection (interesting because this is a new technology but already reasonably high take up).
They also look at differences between use for life and use for study. There are a small minority who never or rarely use email. Also, there is a very low use of virtual worlds - the educational use of virtual worlds is not being driven by the young people. Roughly 50% are using SMS for learning.
They are not a generation! There is no consistency and often low take up. For example, 21.5% contributed to a blog, 12.1% contributed to a wiki. There is no coherent effect.
In general use exceeds requirements to use but students are also unclear about what is required!
If they are using tools for social life and leisure, they are more likely to use in learning. There are some age differences but their are also big differences within age groups. However there are some age related differences. For example over 50% of younger people who download documents read them on screen. There is however a moral panic, see for example Baroness Greenfield's comments on Facebook. {See Bad Science for an excellent citique of the Baroness' comments. - DM}
Questions raised the wifi access finding and pointed out the rise of pay as you go services and links with broadband connections may mean this is reaching into groups that it would normally not have considered wifi connections.
Wednesday, March 18, 2009
Digital Natives: Fact Or Fiction?
When Prensky first published his paper on Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants, it seemed to capture peoples imagination. Certainly, the name and the concept spread quickly thrugh the education community and the phrase (and explanation) was widely quoted.
Other people expounded similar ideas with different names, e.g. the Net Generation, Homo Zappiens and Generation C, however, the term Digital Native seemed to spread with extraordinary rapidity and to take hold widely.
Yet now there seems to be a backlash. People are questionning the concept, including some of the people who helped spread the word in the first place. However, it seems to me, that there must have been something in the idea in the first place for it to have captured people's attention and imagination so effectively.
It struck me that our PGDE(S) course might be a good place to look for evidence to support or undermine the Digital Native thesis as it is a large course (currently over 400 students) with a wide spread of ages. Also, I have six years worth of questionnaire data on students' ICT skills and their attitude to ICT in education. I am therefore trying to write an dissertation on Digital Natives: Fact Or Fiction using evidence from the PGDE(S) course and background reading and student interview.
I would welcome any comments you have or suggestions for what I should read to inform my thinking. All thoughts, facts, wild speculation or considered opinion welcome.
Other people expounded similar ideas with different names, e.g. the Net Generation, Homo Zappiens and Generation C, however, the term Digital Native seemed to spread with extraordinary rapidity and to take hold widely.
Yet now there seems to be a backlash. People are questionning the concept, including some of the people who helped spread the word in the first place. However, it seems to me, that there must have been something in the idea in the first place for it to have captured people's attention and imagination so effectively.
It struck me that our PGDE(S) course might be a good place to look for evidence to support or undermine the Digital Native thesis as it is a large course (currently over 400 students) with a wide spread of ages. Also, I have six years worth of questionnaire data on students' ICT skills and their attitude to ICT in education. I am therefore trying to write an dissertation on Digital Natives: Fact Or Fiction using evidence from the PGDE(S) course and background reading and student interview.
I would welcome any comments you have or suggestions for what I should read to inform my thinking. All thoughts, facts, wild speculation or considered opinion welcome.
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