Digital native

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article is about people of the Digital Age. For objects of the age, see Born-digital.
[hide]This article has multiple issues. Please help improve it or discuss these issues on the talk page. (Le
how and when to remove these template messages)
This article needs additional citations for verification. (June 2008)
This article possibly contains original research. (September 2015)

The term digital native was coined and popularized by education consultant Marc Prensky in his
2001 article entitled Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants, in which he relates the contemporary decline
in American education to educators' failure to understand the needs of modern students. His article [1]

posited that "the arrival and rapid dissemination of digital technology in the last decade of the 20th
century" had changed the way students think and process information, making it difficult for them to
excel academically using the outdated teaching methods of the day. In other words, children raised
in a digital, media-saturated world, require a media-rich learning environment to hold their attention,
and Prensky dubbed these children "digital natives". Contextually, his ideas were introduced after a
decade of worry over increased diagnosis of children with ADD and ADHD, which itself turned out to
[2]

be largely overblown. Prensky did not strictly define the digital native in his 2001 article, but it was
[3]

later, arbitrarily, applied to children born after 1980, because computer bulletin board
systems and Usenet were already in use at the time. The idea became popular among educators
and parents, whose children fell within Prensky's definition of a digital native, and has since been
embraced as an effective marketing tool. It is important to note that Prensky's original paper was
[4]

not a scientific one, and that no empirical data exists to support his claims. He has since abandoned
his digital native metaphor in favor of digital wisdom. More recently, the Digital Visitor and
[5]

Resident idea has been proposed as an alternative to understanding the various ways individuals
engage with digital technology.
Globally, 30 percent of the population born between 1988 and 1998 has used the Internet for over
five years as of 2013. [6]

Contents
[hide]

1Origins

2Conflicts between generations

3Discourse

4See also

5References

6Notes

7Further reading

8External links

Origins[edit]
Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants Marc Prensky defines the term "digital native" and applies it to a
new group of students enrolling in educational establishments referring to the young generation as
"native speakers" of the digital language of computers, videos, video games, social media and other
sites on the internet. People who were "born digital", first appeared in a series of presentations
by Josh Spear beginning in May 2007. A Digital Native research project is being run jointly by
[7][8] [9]

the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School and the Research Center for
Information Law at the University of St. Gallen in Switzerland. A collaborative research project is [10]

being run by Hivos, Netherlands and the Bangalore-based Centre for Internet and Society. The Net
Generation Encountering e-learning at university project funded by the UK research councils was
[11]

completed in March 2010. More recently the Museum of Social Media, launched in 2012, has [12]

included an exhibit on "Digital Natives & Friends."

Conflicts between generations[edit]

Due to the obvious divide set between digital natives and digital immigrants, sometimes both
generations are forced to meet which commonly results in conflicting ideologies of digital
technology . The everyday regime of work-life is becoming more technologically advanced with
[citation needed]

improved computers in offices, more complicated machinery in industry etc. With technology moving
so fast it is hard for digital immigrants to keep up .
[citation needed]

This creates conflicts among older supervisors and managers with the increasingly younger
workforce . Similarly, parents clash with their children at home over gaming, texting, YouTube,
[citation needed]

Facebook and other Internet technology issues. Much of the world's Millennials and Generation
Z members are digital natives. According to law professor and educator John Palfrey, there may be
[13]

substantial differences between digital natives and non digital natives, in terms of how people see
relationships and institutions and how they access information. In spite of this, the timetable for
[14]

training young and old on new technology is about the same. [15]

Education, as Prensky states, is the single largest problem facing the digital world as our digital
immigrant instructors, who speak an outdated language (that of the pre-digital age), are struggling to
teach a population that speaks an entirely new language. Digital natives have had an increased
exposure to technology, which has changed the way they interact and respond to digital devices. In [16]

order to meet the unique learning needs of digital natives, teachers need to move away from
traditional teaching methods that are disconnected with the way students learn today. For the last [16]

20 years, technology preparation for teachers has been at the forefront of policy. However, [17]

Immigrants suffer complications in teaching natives how to understand an environment which is

"native" to them and foreign to Immigrants. Teachers not only struggle with proficiency levels and
their abilities to integrate technology into the classroom, but also, display resistance towards the
integration of digital tools. Since technology can be frustrating and complicated at times, some
[18]

teachers worry about maintaining their level or professionalism within the classroom. Teachers [18]

worry about appearing "unprofessional" in front of their students. Although technology presents
[18]

challenges in the classroom, it is still very important for teachers to understand the unique
affordances these digital tools have for students. [18]

To meet the unique learning needs of digital natives, Forzani and Leu suggest that digital tools are
able to respond immediately to the natural, exploratory, and interactive learning style of students
today. Learning how to use these digital tools not only provides unique learning opportunities for
digital natives, but they also provide necessary skills that will define their future success in the digital
age. One preference to this problem is to invent computer games to teach digital natives the lessons
they need to learn, no matter how serious. This ideology has already been introduced to a number of
serious practicalities. For example, piloting an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) in the army consists of
someone sitting in front of a computer screen issuing commands to the UAV via a hand-held
controller which resembles, in detail, the model of controllers that are used to play games on an
Xbox 360 game console. (Jodie C Spreadbury, Army Recruiting and Training Division). [19]
Gamification as a teaching tool has sparked interest in education, and Gee suggests this is because
games have special properties that books cannot offer for digital natives. For instance, gamification
provides an interactive environment for students to engage and practice 21st century skills such as
collaboration, critical thinking, problem solving, and digital literacy. Gee presents four reasons why
gamification provides a distinct way of learning to promote 21st century skills. First, games are
based on problem solving and not on ones ability to memorize content knowledge. Second,
gamification promotes creativity in digital natives where they are encouraged to think like a designer
or modify to redesign games. Third, digital natives are beginning to co-author their games through
the choices they make to solve problems and face challenges. Therefore, students' thinking is
stimulated to promote metacognition since they have to think about their choices and how they will
alter the course and outcome of the game. Lastly, through online gaming, digital natives are able to
collaborate and learn in a more social environment. Based on the literature, one can see the
potential and unique affordances digital tools have, such as online games, to meet the unique
learning needs of digital natives. Furthermore, online gaming seems to provide an interactive and
engaging environment that promotes the necessary skills digital natives will need to be successful in
their future.

Discourse[edit]

Different approaches to educate the digital native

Not everyone agrees with the language and underlying connotations of the digital native. The [20][21]

term, by definition, suggests a familiarity with technology that not all children and young adults who
would be considered digital natives have; some instead have an awkwardness with technology that
not all digital immigrants have. For instance, those on the disadvantaged side of the digital
[citation needed]

divide lack access to technology. In its application, the concept of the digital native preferences
those who grow up with technology as having a special status, ignoring the significant difference
between familiarity and creative application. [citation needed]

The term "digital immigrant" overlooks the fact that many people born before the digital age were the
inventors, designers, developers and first users of digital technology and in this sense could be
regarded as the original "natives". To confuse the prolific (and arguably superficial) use of digital
technology by current adolescents as deep knowledge and understanding is potentially misleading
and unhelpful to the discourse. The term also discounts the broader and more holistic knowledge,
experience and understandings that older generations may have about digital technologies and their
potential place in society. Digital immigrants are believed to be less quick to pick up new
technologies than digital natives . This results in the equivalent of a speaking accent when it
[citation needed]

comes to the way in which they learn and adopt technology . A commonly used example is that
[citation needed]

a digital immigrant may prefer to print out a document to edit it by hand rather than doing onscreen
editing.
The classification of people into digital natives and digital immigrants is controversial. Some digital
immigrants surpass digital natives in tech savvy, but there is a belief that early exposure to
technology fundamentally changes the way people learn. The actual classification of people into
immigrants and natives is tricky as the adoption of digital technology hasn't been a unified
phenomenon worldwide. For North America, most people born prior to 1980 are considered digital
immigrants. Those closer to the cutoff are sometimes called digital intermediates, which means they
started using digital technology in their early teens and thus are closer to digital natives in terms of
their understanding and abilities.
The term "digital native" is synonymous with the term "digital inclusion". Being digitally included
means that you are innately able in using a smartphone or computer tablets: modern technology has
enabled the non-speaking to speak, the non-hearing to hear and the non-seeing to see. Crucially,
[22]

there is debate over whether there is any adequate evidence for claims made about digital
natives and their implications for education. Bennett, Maton & Kervin (2008), for example, critically
review the research evidence and describe some accounts of digital natives as having an academic
form of a moral panic. concluded that generation does not explain differences in how learners use
[23]

technology and that there is no empirical research to support claims made by Prensky and other
proponents of the idea of the digital native. Using such a terminology is rather a sign of unfamiliarity
and exoticism in relation to digital culture. Of course, nobody is "born digital"; as with any cultural
technology, such as reading and writing, it is matter of access to education and experience.
It considers that all youths are digital natives in the modern age. However, this is not the case. It is
primarily based on cultural differences and not by age. According to Henry Jenkins (2007), "Part of
the challenge of this research is to understand the dynamics of who exactly is, and who is not, a
digital native and what that means." There are underlying conflicts on the definition of the term
"digital natives" and it is wrong to say that all modern age youths are placed in that particular
category or that all older adults can be described as digital immigrants. Some adults are more tech
savvy than a lot of children, depending on socio-economic standings, personal interests, etc., but as
teachers we must include the world outside with which the children are familiar and use it inside the
classroom.
The formulation of digital native is also challenged by researchers looking at emerging technology
landscapes. The current discourse concentrates largely on developed technology and has a
particular bias towards white, middle-class youth who have the privilege of access to technology.
Nishant Shah (2009) says, "It is necessary to promote research that grasps that not all Digital
Natives are equal. Each context will have certain norms by which digital nativity is understood and
experienced. Dismantling the universal Digital Native and considering contextualised Digital Native
identities might also help us move away from speaking of the Digital Native as a necessarily elite
power-user of technology and understand the identity as a point of departure from earlier
technology-mediated identities within those contexts." He also suggests that one way of
understanding digital natives is to look at how they use digital technologies to engage with their
immediate environments and initiate processes of social and personal change. [24]

It is possible to argue that digitality is not a birth-right but instead a product of cultural capital.
According to its originator, Pierre Bordieu, cultural capital is defined as "the possession of certain
cultural competencies, bodies of cultural knowledge, that provide for distinguished modes of cultural
consumption". Familiarity with technology and ease of use is a form of social capital that allows
[25]

those who possess it to advance in society.In fact, scholars have commented on the variability of
technological literacy in different social groups. In "Communities, Cultural Capital and the Digital
Divide," Viviana Rojas calls this phenomenon a person's "techno-disposition". This familiarity with
technology is one of many privileges granted by cultural capital. She defines techno-disposition more
explicitly as "practices, perceptions and attitudes, technical education, awareness of technology,
desires for information, job requirements, social relations with community members and community
organizations, and geographical location." One's techno-disposition, not simply one's access to
[26]

technology, she argues, is at the root of any digital divide.

[27]
As we move into the second decade of the 21st century, others are calling into question Prenskys
Digital/Immigrant dichotomy on different grounds. Jones & Shao (2011) recently conducted a
[28]

literature review for the UK Higher Education Academy which found that there was no empirical
evidence of a single new generation of young students. They argued that complex changes were
taking place but there was no evidence of a generation gap. The nature of the metaphor itself is
challenged, with White and Le Cornu (2011) drawing attention to the difficulties that a language-
based analogy introduces, especially when then linked to age and place. They also highlight the
rapid technological advances that have been made in the last ten years, most notably in the advent
of social networking platforms. White and Le Cornu therefore propose an alternative metaphor
of Visitors and Residents which they suggest more accurately represents the ways in which learners
engage with technology in a social networking age.