These articles were really interesting to read. There were many good points made in them, things that I had never really thought about before. I also really enjoyed the video, it restated some statistics that that the articles had said and it also stated some new ones. It was great to be able to watch the video because I am more of a visual learner. Even though we did have to read, having the music in the background and the different colored words helped me remember what the video was saying.
I believe that I am in between the Native and Immigrant stage. I do understand how to use most technology and I can figure out what people are talking about when they reference technology. I do talk on my cell phone all the time and if I’m not talking on it I’m using it for texting. I personally didn’t get my first cell phone until I was sixteen, so unlike the eight year olds that have cell phones today, I did not grow up with this luxury. I also remember when my family first got the internet…it was so slow compared to today. According to the article Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants, “Today’s students – K through college – represent the first generations to grow up with this new technology. They have spent their entire lives surrounded by and using computers, videogames, digital music players, video cams, cell phones, and all the other toys and tools of the digital age.” I also did not grow up playing video games all the time, my parents made sure that I played outside and stayed an active kid. And as far as digital music players go, I did not get an iPod until I was almost done with high school. So, yes I do understand and use most technology in today’s world but, unlike the article says, I did not grow up with all this technology in my house.
As a learner I was expected to be able to use the internet to look up information and create projects. Also, just using the computer in general, ever since grade school I’ve been expected to write papers for classes. In class we watched videos and used overhead projectors. But in college, where there is a little more funding due to the height of tuition, we have been using a lot more technology. For example at Concordia we have smart boards in every classroom in the new library. Those have such potential for helping the class learn. Not only can you project information on them, but you can pull up the internet and then have the students come up and use their hands to move things around on the board and interact with the subject matter. I thought that Marc Prensky made a great point in his article Do they Really Think Differently? when he said, “Elementary school, when you strip out the recesses and the lunch and the in-between times, actually consists of about three hours of instruction time in a typical 9 to 3 day. 28 So assuming, for example, that learning games were only 50% educational, if you could get kids to play them for six hours over a weekend, you’d effectively add a day a week to their schooling! Six hours is far less than a Digital Native would typically spend over a weekend watching TV and playing videogames. The trick, though, is to make the learning games compelling enough to actually be used in their place. They must be real games, not just drill with eye-candy, combined creatively with real content.” The classes I remember best from high school, or even elementary school, are the ones that were engaging and exciting to me. They are the ones that caught my attention and were fun.
These articles made some great points. They helped explain how different the word is for kids today versus when I was a kid, not that I’m all that old right now. That alone changed my opinion because, even though I feel like I am pretty tech savvy, these articles and the video pointed out how little I knew how to use the technology of today. I also liked the idea “Maybe—and I think that this is the case—today’s kids are challenging us, their educators, to engage them at their level, even with the old stuff, the stuff we all claim is so important, that is, the ‘curriculum.’” that Marc Prensky made in the article Engage me or Enrage Me. I never thought that the students were challenging the teachers. They may not intentionally be doing it but because they grew up in such a technology centered world they are trying to make teachers use more technology to engage them and make them interested.
Overall I believe that these articles were very helpful to me and I’m sure that I am going to use them in the future.
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ReplyDeleteAfter reading your post, I think we are extremely similar in accordance with technology. We both see ourselves as being in between being a Digital Native and Immigrant. I laughed when you said the internet you had at first was really slow, because so was mine, I had dial-up for a long time! I also agree with you that I think people our age, I am 20, were encouraged to play outside more than just playing hours and hours of video games like most children today do.
ReplyDeleteThose Smart Boards are really cool, huh? :) In high school we only had overhead projectors, which were good for putting up transparences, but Smart Boards can do so much more, like you said. Teachers can blow up internet sites for the whole class to see and interact with it, which is awesome.
I forgot what age level you want to teach, but I want to teach somewhere between 3rd and 5th grade, and I never thought of them actually wanting to challenge teachers to engage them, or they’ll become enraged, just like the article said. And I like what you said about them not physically “challenging” us, but they are subconsciously challenging us, or else they will be bored and not try and learn. Good post!