Theories for the digital age: The digital natives discourse

Is learning in the 21^st Century significantly different to learning in previous years? One of the more controversial theories of the digital age is the claim that technology is changing (or rewiring) our brains (Greenfield, 2009) whilst some also claim that prolonged use of the Web is detrimental to human intellectual development (Carr, 2010). It could be argued that these theories stem back to the seminal claim of Marshall McLuhan (1964) that ‘we shape our tools and thereafter, our tools shape us.’ This belief was also the basis for the Digital Natives and Immigrants theory (Prensky, 2001), a persistent discourse that has greatly influenced the thinking of educators in recent years. A significant body of work has arisen around the Digital Natives and Immigrants theory, including descriptions of younger students as ‘the Net Generation’ (Tapscott, 1998), ‘Screenagers’ (Rushkoff, 1996), ‘Born Digital’ (Palfrey and Gasser, 2008), ‘Millennials’ (Oblinger, 2003), and ‘Homo Zappiens’ (Veen and Vrakking, 2006). The latter theory suggests that younger students learn differently, through searching rather than through absorbing, through externalising rather than through internalising information, are better at multitasking, and see no separation between playing and learning (Veen & Vrakking, 2006).

If these theories are true, and younger students do learn differently, the implications for education are profound, demanding changes to the way formal learning content is developed, delivered and organised, and a reappraisal of our conception of knowledge and what it means for education. There are, inevitably, objections to the Digital Natives position.

All of the above theories tend to characterise younger learners as being different to previous generations in their use of technology. These positions are countered by researchers who maintain that such claims are largely based on anecdotal and intuitive arguments, and that there is no significant difference in the way younger or older students manage their online learning activities (Crook and Harrison, 2008; Ito et al, 2009; Kennedy et al, 2010) and that the current generation of learners is far from homogenous (Bennett et al, 2008; Jones and Healing, 2012). Bennett et al (2008) also assert that there is no clear evidence that multi-tasking is a new phenomenon and exclusively the preserve of younger learners. Jones and Healing (2010) criticise the Digital Natives and Immigrants theory as too simplistic, and point out that a greater complexity exists in the way students of all ages use technology, based not on generational differences, but on agency and choice. There is yet further dissent. Vaidhyanathan (2008) argues that ‘there is no such thing as a digital generation.’ He suggests that every generation has an equal distribution of individuals with low, medium and high levels of technology competency. Vaidhyanathan is uncomfortable with the erroneous misclassification of generations and associated assumptions of technology competency levels, and warns: ‘We should drop our simplistic attachments to generations so we can generate an accurate and subtle account of the needs of young people – and all people, for that matter.’

Perhaps the most sensible advice comes from Selwyn (2009) who argues that contrary to the popularist beliefs expressed in the Digital Natives discourse, young people’s engagement with technology is often unspectacular (Livingstone, 2009). According to Selwyn, accounts of Digital Natives are often based on anecdotal evidence, are inconsistent or exaggerated, and hold very little in common with the reality of technology use in the real world. The Digital Natives discourse tends to alienate older generations from technology, and teachers can make dangerous assumptions about the capabilities of young people (Kennedy et al, 2010). Selwyn counsels: ‘Whilst inter-generational tensions and conflicts have long characterised popular understandings of societal progression, adults should not feel threatened by younger generations’ engagements with digital technologies, any more than young people should feel constrained by the “pre-digital” structures of older generations’ (Selwyn, 2009, p. 376).

Arguably the most useful explanatory framework for current online activities is offered by White and Le Cornu (2011), who have argued that habitual use of technology develops sophisticated digital skills regardless of the age or birth date of the user. They call these users ‘Digital Residents’ and suggest that those who are ‘Digital Visitors’ are less likely to be digitally adept because of their casual or infrequent use of digital tools.

References
Bennett, S., Maton, K. and Kervin, L. (2008) The ‘digital natives’ debate: A critical review of the evidence, British Journal of Educational Technology, 39 (5), 775–786.
Carr, N. (2010) The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains.

New York, NY: W. W. Norton.
Crook, C. and Harrison, C. (2008) Web 2.0 Technologies for Learning at Key Stages 3 and 4,Coventry: Becta Publications.
Greenfield, S. (2009) The Quest For Identity In The 21st Century. London: Sceptre.
Ito, M., Horst, H., Bittanti, M. and Boyd, D. (2009) Living and Learning with New Media. Cambridge: MIT Press.
Jones C. and Healing G. (2010) Net Generation Students: Agency and Choice and the New Technologies. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 26, (3), 344–356.
Kennedy, G., Judd, T., Dalgarnot, B. and Waycott, J. (2010) Beyond Digital Natives and Immigrants: Exploring Types of Net Generation Students, Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 26 (5), 332-343.
Livingstone, S.(2009) Children and the Internet. Cambridge: Polity Press.
Oblinger, D. (2003) Boomers, Gen-xers, and Millennials: Understanding the new students. Educause Review. 38 (4).
Palfrey, J. and Gasser, U. (2008) Born Digital: Understanding the First Generation of Digital Natives.New York, NY: Basic Books.
Prensky, M. (2001) Digital Natives, Digital ImmigrantsOn the Horizon, 9 (5).
Rushkoff, D. (1996) Playing the Future: What we can learn from digital kids. London: Harper Collins.
Selwyn, N. (2011) The Digital Native: Myth and Reality. Aslib Proceedings,61 (4), 364-379.
Tapscott, D. (1998) Growing up Digital: The Rise of the Net Generation. New York: McGraw Hill.
Vaidhyanathan, S. (2008) Generation Myth.The Chronicle of Higher Education.
Veen, W. and Vrakking, B. (2006) Homo Zappiens: Growing up in a Digital Age London: Network Continuum Education.
White, D. S. and Le Cornu, A. (2011) Visitorsand Residents: A new typology for online engagement. First Monday, 16 (9).

Image source

[This is an excerpt from a forthcoming publication entitled: Personal Technologies in Education: Issues, Theories and Debates]


Theories for the digital age: The digital natives discourse by Steve Wheeler is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

(re)Designing learning in a digital world

(re)Designing Learning Spaces for a Digital World

View more presentations from Steve Wheeler

My keynote speeches to academic staff at Massey University on the Palmerston North and Wellington campuses this week were accompanied by the slides above. I deliberately inserted a (re) in front of the Designing theme, because I wanted to make it clear that we need to redesign and re-engineer many of our current practices in higher education, including course design, assessment and student support. Things are changing, and so is the nature of knowledge. No longer is it enough for teachers to transmit knowledge to students - much of it quickly goes out of date. In order to prepare students for a coming world of work we cannot clearly describe, we need to instill a flexible set of transferrable skills that include adaptability, change management, creative problem solving, collaboration and a range of digital literacies that will enable them to meet any challenges head on.

In the keynote presentations I tackled some contentious topics, including the issuing of challenges to a number of long standing and widely accepted theories (or beliefs) about how learning occurs. Yesterday's post will give you some clues about my views of learning style theory, but I also challenged a number of 'digital age' theories, including Marc Prensky's notorious Digital Natives and Immigrants theory, Wim Veen and Ben Vrakking's rather more insidious Homo Zappiens model, and Don Tapscott and Anthony William's Net Generation theory. I also challenged Maslow's hierarchy model of motivational needs, and Neil Fleming's VAK modality model of learning approaches. Even Vygotsky's ZPD (Zone of Proximal Development) was placed under the microscope as we travelled through a landscape of emerging pedagogies that are aligned to supporting learners in a digital age. Previous commentary by other more eloquent and eminent critics would be better to pursue than any I could possibly articulate here, but in the meantime, I hope these slides will serve in some small way to illustrate the key messages. If you were at either of the two presentations and wish to add your comments or questions you are most welcome to do so in the comments box below.


(re)Designing learning in a digital world by Steve Wheeler is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

The natives are revolting

I was deliberately provocative on Twitter this morning when I tweeted this:

In just a few hours I had responses of all hues and colours, some agreeing, some disagreeing, many wanting more flesh to be put on the subject. So here, just for the record are my own, and other people's thoughts on the controversy of Marc Prensky's Digital Natives and Immigrants theory. Prensky originally suggested that those who were born before the digital age are immigrants, whilst those who have grown up with technology are the natives. The implications for this dichotomy?

Children don't need instruction manuals to use technology - they expect the device to teach them. Older people - the immigrants - can't multitask like younger 'natives' can, because they are not as immersed in the gaming culture, and therefore don't live at 'twitch speed'. Older people have a foot in the past, and speak technology with an 'accent' that they cannot lose, while younger people are naturally adept at using new and emerging technologies. OK, this is a potted version of Prensky's article, and you can read the entire thing for yourself at the link above. I won't begin to deconstruct his ideas on the supposed 'cognitive changes' he suggests are taking place in the heads of younger users. I'll leave that for another blog post.

A welter of similar terminologies have emerged alongside Prensky's 2001 distinction. Veen and Vrakking published an entire book dedicated to an analysis of ' Homo Zappiens ', whilst Diane Oblinger, Don Tapscott and others popularised the now oft repeated phrase 'Net Generation'. Other terms, such as 'Net Savvy Youth', 'Screenagers' and the 'Google Generation' played on a supposed distinction between age groups, and in doing so, created a dangerous perception that the two really were somehow different. As a response to this feeding frenzy, Mark Bullen set up a blogsite entitled 'Net Gen Skeptic', which he has used to attempt to debunk much of the rhetoric that has been generated on the subject. Bullen actually speaks a lot of sense, and in a recent interview said:

"...my basic point is that the claims about this generation are not based on research. They are speculations that emerge from anecdotal observations and from a techno-utopic view of the world and a fascination with technology. I don’t dispute that this generation is different than previous generations. Every generation differs from the previous in some way. The social, political and technological context changes so this is bound to have an impact on the people growing up at that time. But before we start making radical changes to the way to do things in education we need some evidence." (from Open Education.net)

Bullen goes on to warn of the dangers that lurk when politicians and school leaders swallow the digital natives theory whole and assume that policy and provision should be based upon it:

"...there is an assumption that because this generation is much more immersed in digital technologies for primarily social and recreational purposes that they a) want to use them for educational purposes and b) will be skilled at using these technologies for educational purposes. I have yet to see any evidence to support these assumptions. Also, some of the claims are the same or very similar to claims that have been made about every generation of young people: impatient, social, prefer to learn by doing, and goal oriented." (from Open Education.net)

The message is clear: teachers should not assume that because many children are adept at using new and emerging technology, that they are able to apply them freely in formalised learning contexts such as school. Nor as a result, should they shy away from using technology in the classroom with the fear that 'the children will know more about it than me' - children may have skills in the use of technology, but teachers have the skills and the knowledge to create engaging and exciting learning opportunities and environments. Technology is simply a part of that equation.

JISC has also produced a research based rebuttal of the Google Generation and several other evidence based refutations have recently been published, including Neil Selwyn's Digital Natives: The Myth and the Reality in which he provides a measured commentary of the difficulties the theory imposes upon education. The Chronicle has weighed in with its own report entitled Generational Myth while a useful critical review of the digital natives debate so far, has been captured by Bennett et al in the British Journal of Educational Technology. Finally, David White (University of Oxford) has proposed his own alternative theory - the Residents and Visitors theory, which is not based on the false distinction of age, but rather on perceptions of usefulness and habituation within digital environments. The evidence is now stacking up that there is indeed a lot of doubt being cast over the digital natives and immigrants theory. It's interesting that although Marc Prensky has revised his theory, with a much more measured 'digital wisdom' approach, many people are either ignorant of it, or simply choose to continue to subscribe to, and quote from the digital natives theory. Perhaps it conveniently suits their purpose....?


The natives are revolting by Steve Wheeler is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

Hasta la (MS) Vista Baby

Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger's decision to ditch textbooks in favour of Internet resources and other digital materials in Californian schools is a bold one, but it's hardly original. I'm a fan of Arnie as both an actor and politician, but I suspect on this occasion he is more interested in saving money than he is in raising the quality of learning on the US West Coast. True, digital material is easier to update and children do tend to have a natural affinity with gadgets and gizmos, notwithstanding all the rhetoric over Prensky's digital natives theory.

However, the cynical amongst us will point to California's state deficit of more than 24 billion dollars as the real inspiration behind Arnie's decision. But his decision may, and probably will, pay dividends of another kind in the future, providing he can drag the teachers along with him on his scheme. It will need to be more than just 'Hasta la (Microsoft) Vista, baby' for Arnie and his team, though. The use of digital media, and particularly social media such as Facebook and Twitter, must surely be the way forward to transform education in all sectors. But it should not be at the detriment of other forms of established, successful learning through more traditional methods. Books still have a place in pedagogy and probably always will have.

My research for the statewide project to wire the schools of South Dakota 7 years ago showed that digital technologies sit comfortably side by side with traditional media. We also found that learning is not transformed simply by the deployment of technology, but by its creative use to enhance learning opportunities and create new experiences. And only then, if the teachers will buy into it.

So Mr Terminator, whatever your motives, do forge ahead with your reforms, but please don't throw out the baby with the bathwater.

Relevant links:

Anthea Lipsett: Education by ebook branded a cheapskate scheme
Terry Freedman: Some pros and cons of online textbooks

Image source

Cyborg nation?

Here's a continuation of my post-publication review of the highlights of 'Connected Minds, Emerging Cultures' - the book on cybercultures in online learning released last week by Information Age Publishers, USA.

Chapter 12 is called 'Cyber Theory and Learning' and was written by Vasi van Deventer of the University of South Africa. Vasi has written an engaging and stimulating account of how humans integrate new technologies into their lives, thoughts, and in some extreme cases, even into their bodies. The cybernetic organism, or 'cyborg', Vasi claims, is something we are all a lot farther down the road to becoming than we think. Adopting Andy Clark's 'natural born cyborg' thesis, Vasi argues that Net Generation people have a mindset that is:

...a way of engaging with the world that is distinctly different from the mindset of those who grew up in the industrial age. In this mindset, computers are not experienced as technology, but form an integral part of what the world is all about (p 178).

van Deventer also argues that it is the Internet and not TV that becomes the primary source of information, and that the cyborg generation need to create through consumption, even if it is merely copying and pasting from multiple sources to create a new mashup text. There are controversial views here - harking back to Marc Prensky's digital natives and immigrants theory, Mark Bullen's rebuttal, 'net generation nonsense' and even a challenge to the rules that govern what we currently consider to be plagiarism, copyright and intellectual freedom. This chapter is not hard to read, because it is written in an accessible style, but some may find it hard to come to terms with - that we are probably irrevocably marching down a long road which will lead to symbiotic relationships between human and computer that may not only be indistinguishable, but also inextricable. What are your views on this position?

(image source: blog.wired.com)

2008 Friends Retro

I have made many new friends in 2008 (picture left: with Paul Kirschner, Paul Walsh and Debby Notts in Barcelona). Here is an alphabetic list of 20, including links to their splendid blogs and excellent websites, but it is by no means exhaustive. There are many other great folks I simply haven't had time to post up here - if you are one of those I have missed, forgive me. Thanks to all of you - you have made my year interesting and stimulating and the conversations I have had with each of you have been fabulous.

Have a peaceful and prosperous new year!

• Tara Alexander (University of Plymouth) - only met Tara @blueocean47 a few weeks back when she joined us from the great state of Texas, but already we are working together on some research around Web 2.0. Tara has a lot of energy and learns fast - it's great to work with her.
• Andy Black (Handheld Learning, London and Online Educa, Berlin) Andy's Black Hole was known to me long before I bumped into him. Andy @andyjb is a dynamo and you need to stand well clear when he gets going...
• danah boyd (Handheld Learning, London) What a pleasure, after reading her work for so long, to finally talk to danah, and then to have the whole conversation recorded and posted to the web.
• Mark Bullen (Open EduTech, Barcelona) Another academic whose work I was familiar with long before I met him. A foil to Prensky and a great all round guy.
• Dianne Conrad (EDEN, Lisbon) We met at breakfast and spent a great deal of time during the conference. It was a pleasure to share ideas and discuss distance education for a few days in the sun of colourful Lisbon.
• Jay Cross (Edumedia, Salzburg) Jay is the informal learning guy, and a great image maker too. He spent the evening before the conference taking pictures of us all, and then when he gave his keynote, there we all were - on his first slide
• Ulf-Daniel Ehlers (EDEN, Lisbon and Online Educa, Berlin) - the gentle giant - full of ideas and well respected in the field of e-learning. Ulf is an inspiration and a real encouragement to all.
• Philippa Gerbic (IFIP, Kuala Lumpur) - I met Philippa in Kuala Lumpur for the first time after plenty of e-mails. This kiwi and I worked together with Elizabeth Stacey on a new volume on blended learning which is published in the new year.
• Mirjam Hauck (EDEN, Lisbon) - another dynamo, this time of the feminine variety. Mirjam and I were partners in crime as we blogged our way through the EDEN conference together.
• Wolf Hilzensauer (Edumedia, Salzburg and ICL, Villach) - Wolfie has a sense of humour that is wicked and ironic. He is also one of the most knowledgeable people I know on the subject of e-portfolios.
• Sigi Jakob-Kühn (Edumedia, Salzburg) - Sigi is a bundle of fun - we spent quite some time together touring around Salzburg, and we have followed each other ever since through each other's blogs.
• Paul Kirschner (Open EduTech, Barcelona) - I simply need to say 'digital scaffolding' because it was our idea and a joint effort. We are fellow psychologists with a lot more in common, and I hope we can work together again in the near future.
• Debby Knotts (Open EduTech, Barcelona) - it was nice to spend some time with Debby and to work with her in the awesome team 'D' at Open EduTech, in the wonderful, outrageous city of Barcelona.
• Peter Micheuz (IFIP, Kuala Lumpur, and ICL, Villach) - The man who bought my book straight off the shelf in Kuala Lumpur and asked me to sign it on the bus home. I met Peter again when he presented at ICL - and I learned a lot from him.
• Marc Prensky (Handheld Learning, London) - Marc sidled up to danah and I as we discussed digital identity under the unblinking eye of Kramer's camera. I didn't know who he was and he certainly didn't know me. We do now though.
• John Sanders (ICL, Villach) - @greyrab my new Aussie mate with whom I spent a lot of time at ICL. Several meals and drinks, and a day trip to Venice later, we are still in contact through Twitter, even though we are separated by 12 time zones.
• Dirk Schneckenberg (EDEN, Lisbon) - Dirk is a very creative individual, and I look forward to working with Dirk and Ulf on their new edited volume around the idea of Web 2.0 technologies in education next year.
• Kath Trinder (Handheld Learning, London) - @ktrinder Twitter buddy extraordinaire. Nice to finally meet her face to face after all those tweets.
• Jon Trinder (Handheld Learning, London) - @jont - husband of the above, and a jolly decent guy. Rarely laugh so hard as I do when I read some of Jon's tweets.
• Joss Winn (ALT-C, Leeds) - together with James Clay, we created the video 'It's not for girls!' about gender and technology, at ALT-C in Leeds.

Talking shop

Mark Kramer had his camera out a lot at Handheld Learning this year, as usual. He caught several of us in conversation near the front stage before the plenary session. In our conversation, Mark and myself, dana boyd, (and later on Marc Prensky) covered a lot of ground during our informal discussion including the effects of hypermedia, rhizomatic learning, constraints and affordances of technology, microblogging, data mining, democracy and privacy, freedom and online identity, etc... A number of Web 2.0 tools are mentioned including Boing Boing, Twitter, YouTube, blogging and Qik.

Have a listen in - go on, eavesdrop. We really don't mind. I'm just sorry you can't join in directly with the conversation, but you can comment on Mark's website.

What the kids say

For a conference on handheld technologies, there are a lot of laptops about. But people are also recording the action using handhled devices, audio, video, you name it. There is a lot of creativity here at Handheld Learning 2008, and the lighting, music and most importantly, the people, are creating a real buzz of expectation. We are in the plenary session for the conference, and listening to some of the keynotes.

I enjoyed some long discussions before this plenary session with danah boyd, Marc Prensky (who is sat right behind me), Mark Kramer and Steven Berlin Johnson so it pays to get to the conference venue early. danah was talking about the constraints of the technology being probably more important than the affordances, and cited microblogging tools such as Twitter as being particularly creative because they make people think more deeply about their message and also the audience they are writing for. Marc Prensky was talking about the fact that everyone is different and that people have misunderstood some of his ideas about natives and immigrants.

But it's what the kids say that matters the most, because they are the future, and we are watching a video of vox pop on how kids use the internet and technology to learn. A lot of work is being done in inner city schools to engage young minds in collaboration and inhibition in their learning (a quote from Stephen Heppell). There should not be a lot of difference between entertainment and learning and 'brain games' and 'adventure games' are favourites to hook young people. We are also watching a video of a young girl playing with Pictochat on her Nintendo DS Lite. She is scribbling and getting used to the graphics pad - not writing yet, but sitting next tyo her elder sister and learning from her. Lord Puttnam says that the power of the links between the entertainment and education sectors is vital to nurture and propogate. Games, collaboration, entertaining software, adventure and enjoyment. This is the future of education.

In your face, Prensky

Marc Prensky's much quoted work on digital immigrants and digital natives is under attack (again), and his distinction between preferences, behaviours, and ... yes... even cognitive structures ... has been challenged in some recent research. Tom Hanson, Editor of OpenEducation.net shared some links with me this morning and writes:

"In recent months, research has been emerging that calls into question several of the assumptions surrounding the current generation of learners dubbed 'digital natives'. As but one example, the notion that today's students are masters of technology is simply not borne out by research. At OpenEducation.net we recently took an in-depth look at the net generation as it relates to teaching and learning."

Articles he has highlighted for free download include: 'Digital immigrants teaching the net generation much ado about nothing', 'Net Generation Nonsense' (By Mark Bullen), and 'Net generation concerns overhyped'. Well, from the titles, it looks as though these guys have already made up their minds. I have just given a keynote presentation on this very issue to a group of school teachers. I highlighted the widening gap between their use of technology and that of the children they teach. Is it all an illusion then? or is the jury still out on digital natives and immigrants?

I'll get me coat....

At the bleeding edge

Came across an interesting blog on mobile technologies today, called Learn on-the-go. Whilst the title of the blog might be a little twee - (I had disturbing visions of someone reading a book on the toilet) - the content is pretty good, with a review of Marc Prensky's keynote address at the recent Handheld Learning 2007 conference held in London. Whilst not entirely glowing about Prensky's 'Keeping up with change' speech, even labelling him as 'obselete' at one point, this blog writer has some interesting things to say about mobile learning, change management and technology in general...

Here's a top quote from the blog:

'While slower, less progressive educators may still be comfortably exploring e-learning on learning management systems or off CD-ROMs (or, indeed, still doing chalk-and-talk), educators investigating mobile learning are very much at the cutting edge of educational innovation, along with other educators investigating other areas such as the use of social web tools for education, and the use of virtual worlds as learning environments.'

Well, yes, I agree - change is always with us, and shift happens. And I have to nod in agreement that the bleeding edge of learning technology is found in the study of ambient forms of learning, along with 3-D virtual worlds and social networking tools. I'll be bookmarking this blog and paying a return visit or two.