Digital Natives by Dimitra Tsiopela

Digital Natives:

What are the demands of the new generation of students? Education at a critical crossroads – Part I

By Dimitra Tsiopela

SUMMARY

 In this paper, educators are invited to meet the first generation of students born and raised in the digital world. This generation not only has a greater ability to exploit new technologies, but has also developed different ways of thinking, communicating and collaborating. This fact has aroused the interest of scientists, who study the influence of intensive engagement with digital technology on brain development and functions.

Research shows that these “digital” brains develop new skills and use new learning techniques, but at the same time they tend to forget all the skills that are dormant with this new way of life. The upcoming changes in the human way of thinking, in the structure of society and in the concepts of education and learning are commented on. The need to adapt educational methods to these new data, imposed by the needs of tomorrow's students, is underlined.

KEYWORDS: Digital Indigenous Peoples, Digital Technology, Education

IMPORT

 We see them everywhere. They are the kids who wear headphones, who communicate by texting, who type faster than us and who know how to fix our computers when they get stuck. They were all born after 1980, when the first “social” technologies were born. In addition to their police identity, they have many others: on Facebook, in email, in Second Life, on YouTube, in every online game, in their blogs, in Instant Messaging programs. Each of these kids “exists” in the digital world with more than one identity, “wearing” at any given moment the character and appearance they desire. They have hundreds of friends, all over the world, some real and some digital, and they can communicate with all of them at the same time. These are the “Digital Natives”.

The term “Digital Natives” [8] was first used in 2001 by Marc Prensky to describe the new generation of people who, having integrated technology into their lives from the moment they were born, better understand the concepts related to it. At the opposite end are the “Digital Immigrants” [10], that is, those born before 1980 (the definition refers to the USA, where the term originates – in Greece we can talk about Digital Natives born from 1990 onwards), who are called upon to adapt to the language, customs and traditions of the natives. Today’s students, having grown up under different circumstances, have completely different demands in the classroom, compared to us older ones. They are much more easily offended, they cannot stand the lecture-style lesson and they hate the blackboard. They want information to be presented using images, sounds, and movement, to be intense, fast, and interesting. This is entirely to be expected, considering the technology they use in their daily lives.

EDUCATION AT A CRITICAL CROSSROADS

The first generation of “Digital Natives”, that is, children born and raised in the digital world, has come of age and soon our world will be reshaped in their image and likeness. The economy, politics, culture, even the structure of family life, will be transformed forever. At this critical historical moment, teachers are called upon to adapt their lessons so that they meet the demands and needs of this new generation of students[9]. In order to communicate with students, they come into contact for the first time with terms such as Blogs, Wikies, Podcasts, Digital stories, Webquests, Games/simulations and are called upon to integrate all modern means of management, presentation and exchange of information into the educational process. In many schools in the U.S., social networking tools such as Facebook, Twitter, and MySpace have been deployed to ensure children's participation in class, while the use of smart mobile phones (such as iPhones) has also begun to be decriminalized, and teachers often encourage children to use them to search for information on the Internet.

In our country, this effort is now taking its first steps, with the provision of equipment to schools and the training of teachers in New Technologies. For most teachers, however, the use of Web 2.0 tools is still a nightmare and for a few, usually younger, it is limited to presenting the lesson with Powerpoint and chaotically searching for information on the Internet. Nevertheless, being behind in relation to the most technologically advanced countries, such as the United States, offers us a significant advantage: We can today know the future results of the integration of Digital Media in education, through scientific research conducted in countries where this process has already begun for many years. We are given the opportunity to peek into the future of education, to better understand how our students and their needs are changing, but also to know in advance the negative effects of excessive or incorrect use of digital technology.

DIGITAL TECHNOLOGY IS CHANGING THE HUMAN BRAIN

The modern explosion of digital technology is not only changing the way we live and communicate, it is also rapidly and profoundly changing our brains [1]. Daily exposure to it – on computers, smartphones, video games, search engines – triggers changes in brain cells and the release of neurotransmitters, gradually strengthening new neural pathways in our brains while weakening old ones. We may not be aware of the changes in our brain’s neural networks, but they become permanent with frequent repetition. This evolutionary brain process has occurred within a generation and may constitute one of the most unexpected yet crucial developments in human history.

The brains of the younger generation are now functioning differently and developing new features (see Table 1) that humans have not had before [18],[19]. We are witnessing the beginning of a profound brain divide between younger and older minds – within a single generation. What used to be a generation gap, separating the values, music and habits of young people from those of their parents, has now become a vast divide, affecting two different cultures.

 Table 1: The learning characteristics of “Digital Natives”, compared to those of students of previous generations.

WHAT TEACHERS SHOULD CONSIDER IN THE CLASSROOM

Figure 1: Results of an eye-tracking study for three websites. Users looked more at the red areas, less at the yellow, and very little at the blue. They did not look at the gray areas at all.

Neglect  of social skills: As the mind focuses on new technological skills, it shifts away from fundamental social ones. For every 1 hour we spend on the computer, traditional face-to-face interaction is reduced by 30 minutes. With the weakening of the neural networks that control human contact, we tend to misunderstand or even confuse nonverbal messages.

·  Different way of reading text: Studies of online reading habits have discovered something called the “F-shaped pattern for reading online content.”[4] This is the technique of reading horizontally across the first few lines, then halfway through for a few more lines, and then vertically across the rest of the page.

 · Speed ​​and peripheral vision: Using digital technologies sharpens certain cognitive abilities. They learn to react more quickly to visual stimuli and improve many forms of attention, especially the ability to pay attention to images in their peripheral vision. They develop a greater ability to sift through large amounts of information and decide what is important and what is not.

·  Parallel processing Students find television incredibly boring. 1/3 of young people use another medium (usually the internet) while watching television. Even high school students are constantly parallel processing. They download music to their iPods and text their friends while they are doing their homework.

Increased intelligence: The digital evolution of our brains may be increasing our intelligence. Average IQ scores are steadily rising [16] as digital culture evolves and the ability to multitask[17] without errors increases.

Craving for immediate reward: Digital Natives are good at parallel processing, and their access to visual and auditory stimuli has programmed their brains to crave immediate reward. [24] They have shorter attention spans, especially when faced with traditional forms of learning.

· Anxiety and attention deficits: However, research shows that excessive parallel processing can lead to increased anxiety, attention deficits, and decreased performance. Teachers often complain that young people who belong to the parallel processing generation are less effective in their lessons.

· Difficulty generalizing: Some scientists argue that chronic and intense parallel processing may even delay the proper development of the prefrontal cortex [23], the area of ​​the brain that helps us see the big picture, delay gratification, think broadly, and plan for the future.

· ADHD Risk: Chronic exposure to technologies such as television, video games, and computers increases the risk of Attention Deficit Disorder[27],[28]. Research from Brown University showed that adolescents who play games online or on a console for more than an hour a day had more symptoms of ADHD than those who did not play. But neuroscientist Susan Greenfield[12] also warns that texting, Facebook, and other forms of instant communication can lead to an increase in attention deficit disorders.

·  Other health problems: Keeping children up late playing video games, surfing the internet and texting can lead to learning difficulties, mood swings, childhood anxiety[25,][30] and depression[11].

· Difficulties in grammar and syntax: “T knc? vrm p. 3rc tpt?ohi” means “What are you doing? I’m very bored. Do you know anything? No”. This is a typical example of a dialogue via Facebook or via mobile phone (in Greek). Teachers and philologists in Greece and abroad often complain that students’ performance in spelling and syntax is constantly deteriorating. Combined with the fact that an ever smaller percentage of young people read books for pleasure[20], each year fewer and fewer students are able to compose a correct paragraph on their own.

· Less accuracy: Poor spelling seems to be the least of the problems caused by excessive texting. Research conducted in Australia[5] shows that texting teaches young people to be faster but also less accurate. The word prediction system (known as T9), in particular, scientists say, is easy to use but terribly inaccurate. With frequent use, texting can reorganize a child’s brain, making them more inattentive. According to epidemiologist Michael Abramson[5], young people who use their mobile phones a lot make more mistakes in tasks that require memory, periods of concentration and learning. “We suspect it’s a learned behavior pattern,” he says.

 Digital Natives:

What are the demands of the new generation of students? Education at a critical crossroads – Part II

IS THE DIGITAL BRAIN SO INTELLIGENT?

This question has been a point of contention among American scholars in recent years. Opinions are so divided that some describe Digital Natives as the smartest generation of people, while others describe them as the dumbest that has ever existed. John Palfrey and Urs Gasser, heads of the Digital Media Project, a multi-disciplinary research project that aims to study the transition from offline/analog to online/digital media, write in their book “Born Digital: Understanding the First Generation of Digital Natives”[2]:

“Digital Natives are incredibly creative. It’s impossible to say whether they are more or less creative than previous generations, but one thing is certain: They express themselves creatively in ways that are very different from the ways their parents used to at the same age. Many of them see information as malleable, something they can control and reshape in new and interesting ways. This could be from editing a MySpace profile or a Wikipedia entry, to making a film or an online video, or downloading a song—legally or illegally. Whether they realize it or not, they have come to have unprecedented control over their cultural environment.”

In contrast, Mark Bauerlein, in his book with the provocative title “The Dumbest Generation” [3], writes:

“The dawn of the digital age once held promise: the Internet, e-mail, blogs, interactive and hyper-realistic video games promised to produce a generation of smarter, more informed, more intellectually cultivated children. Terms like “information highway” and “knowledge economy” entered the lexicon, and we assumed that teenagers would use their technological know-how and understanding to shape the vanguard of this new age of information overload. That was the promise. But enlightenment has not happened. According to recent reports from government agencies, organizations, polling firms and academic institutions, most young people in the U.S. neither read literature (nor know exactly how to do it), nor work reliably, nor visit cultural institutions (of any kind), nor do they vote (most cannot understand a simple ballot). They cannot explain basic scientific methods, narrate milestones in the country’s history, or name any of the politicians who represent them. The only thing they excel at is being “with each other.” They spend an incredible amount of time electronically sending stories, photos, songs, and texts back and forth, enjoying the attention of their online friends, and inhabiting a world of silly jokes and artless images.”

It is a fact that the digital revolution has sucked us into a state of constant partial attention. This means being constantly busy, having tabs open on everything[29], without really concentrating on anything [22].

CONCLUSIONS

Wherever the truth lies, it is a fact that teachers are now called upon not only to be trained so that they can adapt their lessons to the demands of the Digital Generation of students, but also to face various negative consequences of the integration of high technology into our lives, such as hyperactivity, inability to concentrate, depression and parallel processing mania, and they now need to be prepared for these as well.

They should also remember that while social media, email, and instant messaging may be available, these modes of communication lack the emotional warmth of direct human contact and often exacerbate people's feelings of isolation. The high-tech revolution has also contributed to many forms of anxiety, from chronic generalized anxiety disorder to panic attacks that can be practically disabling.

Digital Natives live most of their lives online, without separating the online from the offline. Instead of treating their digital and real-world identities as separate things, they have only one (with representations in two, three, or more spaces). They don’t see hybrid lives as something strange. Through social media, they connect, talk, and share photos with friends from all over the world. They may even collaborate creatively or politically in ways that would have been impossible thirty years ago. But in this relentlessly connected world, the essence of relationships—even what it means to be “friends” with someone—is changing. Online friendships are based on much the same elements that traditional friendships are based on—shared interests, frequent interaction, and so on—but they also have one very different characteristic: They often disappear, and it’s easy to slip in and out of them without even saying goodbye. And it may also be lasting in ways we don't yet understand.

The brain of a person who grows up in video games [21] and virtual digital worlds is used to saying: “I can quit what I’m doing whenever I want” and “I want a reward here and now! I don’t like the long-term effort that will compensate me in the distant future”. For a person who is used to reading according to the F-pattern, it is very difficult to read even one page of a book with the necessary attention to the entire text. All of these are factors that affect children’s behavior and performance in the classroom, and educators must now take them into account. “We have an open and still changing brain and a technology that requires us to become faster and more automatic. The natural consequence of this is that the likelihood of making mistakes increases,” says Laura-Ann Petitto, a cognitive neuroscientist at the University of Toronto, a pioneer in research on speech disorders.

All of the above is part of the new educational reality. And yet, the teacher gives the student such an assignment: “Go to Google, type in the words, download three relevant websites, cut and paste some pieces into a new document, add the transitions, print it and hand it in”. The new learning model is that of information retrieval and not of knowledge formation. The material goes from the Internet directly to the paper of the assignment, without passing through the students’ minds. “And yet the educational world does not see the danger in these developments and adapts the concept of education to the new reality, which is shaped by how the new generation learns (and does not learn), instead of trying to adapt children to fixed patterns of knowledge and learning”, comments J. Bowman [15].

The pessimistic scenario says that we downgrade verbal and computational skills to “low-level knowledge,” while upgrading the skills of information gathering, pattern recognition, and spatial control, which are enhanced by long hours in front of a computer screen. This will be the first step in a series of downgrades that will follow Digital Natives through high school and college, until everyone comes out of the educational process with a PhD in Googling. The optimistic scenario says that the Digital Age generation will be the most creative and communicative of all. It will change the world and culture in ways we never imagined and will give equal opportunities to more people by providing free and unlimited access to all kinds of information.

Whatever the reality, one thing is certain: the new world of high technology influences how young people develop their sense of self and their worthin the world.[31] The ability to immerse oneself in the fictional universe of a game or the power to be just a few keystrokes away from any friend on the planet shapes – positively or negatively – one’s identity and self-esteem. And these are two fundamental elements that dictate one’s actions and define one’s humanity.

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Published with the author's permission.

Dimitra Tsiopela