Transcript Digital Natives - Houston Baptist University

Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants
Do They Really Think Differently?
EDUC 4306.02 – Dr. Dawn Wilson
Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants
• Our students have changed radically. Today’s
students are no longer the people our
educational system was designed to teach.
–Marc Prensky
• Different kinds of experiences lead to different
brain structures.
–Dr. Bruce D. Perry, Baylor College of Medicine
The Past.
Digital Immigrants
• Not born into the digital world, but have since
adjusted to current technology
• Use the internet and technologies as a second
content source
• Learn step by step; teach step by step
Old
New
Digital
Immigrants
http://scienceblogs.com/clock/past-present-future.jpg
Times have changed.
The Current.
• What the heck is Grandma doing?!?!
Digital Natives
• Technology grown individuals (21st century children)
• Use the internet and technologies as their primary
content source
• Learn through interaction; can we teach them?
5,000 hours of
reading
10,000 hours
of video
games
10,000 hours
of using cell
phones
(text messages
included)
20,000 hours
of television
Do They Really Think Differently?!
According to Marc Prensky:
• Neuroplasticity occurs
throughout life
• People with different
inputs think differently
• As musicians’ brains are
physically different – it is
very possible that Digital
Natives’ brains are also
wired differently
• Digital Natives have
“hypertext minds”
http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/stories/s2623572.htm
Article 1:
Simulations, Games, and Learning
According to Diana Oblinger:
• Promotes active learning
• Connections to Learning
either real or simulated
include:
• Requires personal goals
and decision making
• Involves adaptation and
working well with others
• Creates stronger logic and
social skills
• Mastery of knowledge and
strategic skills
SOCIAL
EXPERIENTIAL
TRANSFER
RESEARCH
PROBLEM
SOLVING
Article 2:
Changing Brains?
• According to Gary Small, M.D.:
– More time in one activity =
stronger pathways for executing
that activity
• Musicians, Athletes
– Internet increases brain’s
capacity to be stimulated
– Greater working memory, better
at perceptual learning, and better
motor skills
http://www.drgarysmall.com/images/cover_iBrain_1.jpg
Gary Small, M.D. Director of the
UCLA Memory & Aging Research
Center at the Semel Institute for
Neuroscience & Human Behavior.
Article 2 (cont):
Thinking Differently…
• Gary Small M.D. says:
– Digital Natives make “snap decisions”
• Can “juggle multiple sources of sensory input”
– Digital Immigrant’s brain is trained differently to socialize
and learn
• Address individual things one at a time
• Step-by-step process
Pros of Technology
• If a “digital native” thinks in a different way…
shouldn’t the classroom teach in a different
manner as well?
• Provides independent learning
• Curriculum available outside the classroom
• Stimulates different learning (auditory, visual)
• Facilitates different learning (kinesthetic)
• Prepares students for today’s world
Cons of Technology
Cons of Technology
Meaningful Learning with Technology
According to David Jonassen:
• “Thinking is enhanced when
learning with technology, not
from it.”
• Technologies are tools that
engage students in deeper
levels of thinking and
reasoning, including causal,
analogical, expressive,
experiential, and problem
solving.
Virtual Classroom.
http://www.jvkco.net/mrb/technology/classroom.html
References
•
Interlandi, Jeneen. “Reading This Will Change Your Brain.” Newsweek 14 Oct. 2008.
Retrieved September 14, 2009, from http://www.newsweek.com/id/163924.
•
Jonassen, D. H. (2000). Computers as mindtools for schools: Engaging critical
thinking. Columbus, OH: Prentice-Hall.
•
Prensky, M. (2001a, September/October). Digital natives, digital immigrants. On
the Horizon, 9(5), 1-6. Retrieved September 14, 2009, from
http://www.marcprensky.com/writing/Prensky%20%20Digital%20Natives,%20Digital%20Immigrants%20-%20Part1.pdf
•
Prensky, M. (2001b, November/December). Digital natives, digital immigrants, part
II: Do they really think differently? On the Horizon, 9(6), 1-6. Retrieved September
14, 2009, from http://www.marcprensky.com/writing/Prensky%20%20Digital%20Natives,%20Digital%20Immigrants%20-%20Part2.pdf
•
Oblinger, Diana. (2006, May). “Simulations, Games, and Learning.” Retrieved
September 14, 2009, from http://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ELI3004.pdf.