Soooo...after last night's emotional group meeting, it took a while to get my mind back on track. I kept wondering if there was something I was doing wrong, or just was it the fact that I did not know that much about technology. Well unfortunately, it was the latter...I went to sleep worrying about this class and woke up to nerves and hesitation. Well that is how my morning is going so far, however, i thought the video clips and reading were very educational.
The article titled "Portrait of a Digital Native" I found to be very good. I love how it starts out with a girl who has many word and websites open-it sounds like me on both a Monday and Wednesday night! I have on average, 10-12 websites open each time, maybe that is why my computer is so slow! Meredith Fear then says that technology is the "gateway to the world." She could not be more right. Technology has the power for any individual to communicate to different parts of the world at any given hour of the day. It really is a beautiful thing. One thing I found to be very interesting, but not at all surprised with the statistic of "one third of young people say they either talk on the phone, instant message, watch TV, listen to music, or surf the Web for fun most of the time they're doing homework." I can remember back to highschool and college, i did those same things-and that was years ago. Meredith Fear said that this is what she and her generation is used to, and doing these things are not at all uncommon in this "digital world." I quote this next part because I find myself agreeing with what Marc Prensky states. Prensky believes that children of today have"had digital technology surrounding them from the time they were infants," he says. "That digital world affords them many things that the previous world didn't." In his article, "Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants," Prensky describes these students as wanting their information extremely fast and being experts at multitasking and networking. Yet he sees schools lagging behind, still tied to an antiquated system that rewards staying on task and on pace with others above more individualized education plans. He says children want to be more engaged in school. Yet despite such calls to action, no clear agreement exists on how to meet this generation's needs, what those needs actually are, and how they differ from those of previous generations." I think Mr. Prensky hit the nail on the head. Children of today are used to fast moving world of tech and expect things to happen at the drop of a hat. The other part i agree with is the fact that school's are lagging behind in the technology part. I can not tell you how many times i have gone into a classroom and have seen students sitting behind computers and the teachers are the ones being taught the different ways to navigate the computer. Not many classrooms even have computers that are highly accessible and that are constantly being used by students. In a world and generation of the computer highway, this has to change. It also goes into how Meredith Fear knows how to study-she likes for there to be a bit of noise around her. If that is something that she does well and, I think she should be able to do it.
In the Marc Prensky article, "Digital Native vs. Digital Immigrants," he brings up some startling points. He mentions that children of today are not getting that quality education that we all received when we were younger. The stat that college grads of today spend less than 5,000 hrs of reading and over 10,000 playing video games and double that amount watching T.V., does not surprise me at all. I grew up in this technological age and am part of that statistic. These DN, like myslef, really do appreciate less and are quickly resorted to technological powers. The DI, are who and what we should be like, ones that used to read for fun because they WANTED to-not because they HAVE to. I liked the line when it mentioned that kids born into the world of today learn the languge of today, therefore, resisting the old. I believe that is so true. Kids learn what they need to know, not what used to be-right? In a world where there are so many single parent households and full time working parent(s), does anybody really have the time to go back in time and teach the way language really should be?
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