In 2001, Mark Prensky authored Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants in which he stated a discontinuity had taken place and that today’s students “think and process information fundamentally differently from their predecessors” (Prensky, 2001, p. 1). As a result, fundamental changes to education should be sought to accommodate this evolution. Prensky asserts that teachers must find a way to instruct what he calls both legacy (reading, writing, arithmetic, logical thinking, etc.) and future content (software, hardware, robotics, nanotechnology, etc.) in a style more conducive to their students apparent learning style which includes moving through material faster and less step-by-step instruction (Prensky, 2001).
In the last decade his work has come under fire, not for the changes to the educational system that he recommends which was the point of the paper, but for his definition of digital natives. The Public Broadcasting Service’s (PBS) Mike Rugnetta, host of the PBS Idea Channel, takes aim at the definition in the first five minutes of this fast pace, rapid delivery monologue.
Rugnetta, just like others such as Bennett, Maton, and Kervin’s 2008 work which synthesizes findings across English-speaking nations, takes issue with the application of the term across an entire generation for many reasons (Bennett, Maton, & Kervin, 2008; PBS Idea Channel, 2013). But what he accurately brings out is that even though one may not have been born in a world filled with digital technology like the one we find ourselves in today, digital fluency can be learned (PBS Idea Channel, 2013). Helsper and Enyon’s 2010 study show that being a digital native may be more the result of one’s breadth of use, experience, self efficacy, and education–not one’s age (Helsper & Enyon, 2010).
References
Bennett, S., Maton, K., & Kervin, L. (2008). The ‘digital natives’ debate: A critical review of the evidence. British Journal of Educational Technology, 39(5), 775-786. doi:10.1111/j.1467-8535.2007.00793.x
Helsper, E., & Enyon, R. (2010). Digital natives: where is the evidence? British Educational Research Journal, 36(3), 503-520. doi:10.1080/01411920902989227
PBS Idea Channel. (2013, Dec 11). Do “Digital Natives” Exist? | Idea Channel | PBS Digital Studios . Retrieved from YouTube: http://youtu.be/9WVKBAqjHiE
Prensky, M. (2001, October). Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants. On the Horizon, 9(5), 1-6.
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There is a difference between learning to navigate a new environment, and living it as someone born and raised immersed in it.
Although perhaps not easy to discern practically, there are still relevant outcomes of the difference between experiencing oneself as not BEING OF, even if one has acquired the capacities to FUNCTION IN, part of an environment.
Alienation on a deep psychological level is about the fact that individuals integrate into a society as they become integrated in it; they do not just learn how to live in it.
Far from merely being a technological “add-on” or modification that causes no significant qualitative change to a cultural and social environment; I would argue that ICT has effects that can cause alienation due to changes in the cultural and social environment and also for those who adapt well to the technological changes.
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