למידה, אינטרנט ... ומה שביניהם

... education plays a role in society that goes beyond reacting to emerging trends. Education's role is one of preparing people for life, for engagement in academic discourse, for awakening and nurturing talents learners are not yet aware of, for critical dialogue on "big trends" and how we should conduct ourselves in relation to these. Quite simply, education utilizes the tools and manner of expression and dialogue of a particular culture in order to transform learners into citizens capable of tackling the increasingly complex problems of the world. Prensky neglects this vital distinction.

This blog is dedicated to debunking the myth of the net generation, particularly as it relates to learning, teaching and the use of technology. By using this forum I hope to start a conversation around this issue and promote an informed discussion of strategies that postsecondary institutions can use to harness the power of Web 2.0 and other learning technologies that is based in fact not rhetoric.

Prensky! Never mind the far more authoritative and - dare I say it - scholarly (and contrary) voices of, say, Knowles, Ramsden and Mezirow! For me, this is further evidence of how edubloggers and e-learning theorists have become a very cloistered bunch who believe that everything is new and are suspicious of anything published before the year 1995!

תוויות: המלצות, מורים, נוער

It is now clear that as a result of this ubiquitous environment and the sheer volume of their interaction with it, today’s students think and process information fundamentally differently from their predecessors.

It appears the tide is finally turning and the uncritical acceptance of the digital natives discourse is giving way to a more nuanced perspective on digital technologies in higher education.

That's like a mini-industry centered around an idea that had a kind of fashionable appeal, but no real basis in evidence. And what of the opportunity costs? While we were fretting about whether they existed or not and what we should do about it, did we miss seeing what was really happening and the more interesting and subtle changes in society in general. And that's a shame because it's not a completely bad idea - many of us feel instinctively that our children are growing up in a different world than we were, but then we're operating in that world too.

תוויות: ילידים

• check Google Street View when they're not home to make sure their house is not on fire
• They can only type with two thumbs, but they don't care, because typing is for old people
• They believe whatever google tells them to believe

I asked students how many of them thought they would be likely to subscribe to a daily newspaper when they grew up. About 70% of the hands went up, which took me aback a bit. I asked students why they thought they would prefer (or already do prefer) reading their news in print instead of online. As they started talking, I realized how relevant some of their comments were to the discussions I’m having with other teachers and ed tech types. So out came the Flip and I captured the rest of the conversation...

תוויות: דיגיטאליות, נייר

A Google search on Dr. Bruce D. Berry brings up quite a number of hits - almost all of them within copies of Prensky's article, or quotes from it. The Baylor College of Medicine web site (with which, Prensky tells us, as of 2001 Berry was affiliated) doesn't seem to mention him at all. Berry may well be an accepted authority on brain development, but, at least via the various searches I conducted - via Google, via Google Scholar, and in a general library catalog - he doesn't seem to have published anything related to brain research, or as far as I can tell, on anything else. I may have missed something (maybe Prensky, and everybody else since then, spelled his name wrong) but I get the feeling that Prensky happened upon a quote that fit his needs and simply milked it for much more than it was worth.

Perhaps what we have here is a case of digital immigrants imitating digital natives. After all, few people would get particularly upset to find that a pupil had copied a passage verbatim from the Wikipedia without checking a bit further up the source chain to see if it was accurate, but were a teacher to do that it would be considered unprofessional. But if the immigrants are going to adjust to the new digital reality, it makes sense that they'll behave around information in the same way that the natives do.

תוויות: טכנולוגיה, פרסום אישי

... precisely the type of population that popular rhetoric assumes to be universally wired and digitally savvy.

Overall, these findings suggest that even when controlling for basic Internet access, among a group of young adults, socioeconomic status is an important predictor of how people are incorporating the Web into their everyday lives with those from more privileged backgrounds using it in more informed ways for a larger number of activities.

Students with higher level know-how engage in more activities online than those who understand the Web less. Of course, these two factors likely have a reinforcing relationship. More diverse types of uses probably feed back into increased user savvy.

... as things stand, the more privileged stand to benefit from it (האינטרנט) more than those in less advantageous positions raising concerns about possibly increased rather than decreased inequality resulting from the spread of Internet use across the population.

תוויות: פער דיגיטאלי

Students are not the same as they were 20 years ago.

Today they blog, tweet, text, listen to iTunes and write a paper all at once. They are technology addicts who are constantly multitasking — in and out of the classroom.

That's how they learn. That's how they think.

Faculty also have the help of 15 eMentors who work across the four campuses. The eMentors are faculty members enthusiastic about using technology in teaching with extensive experience to share.

תוויות: ילידים

While I understand the desire for convenience, I have long argued that when students take classes online, they are learning not only the subject matter but technology skills. Being exposed to more than one system means they are learning transferability of those skills, which I think is important in the workplace. And it’s more important than the inconvenience of using a second log-in (which they do anyway because they have Facebook open at the same time).

They know just enough to be dangerous. They have enough experience to want convenience and not enough to understand the larger issues of pedagogy, including the restrictiveness of an LMS on what the instructor wants to do. They can drive but have no sense of how traffic works.

In a world dominated by look-alike online classes, the tendency will be to assume all classes should be that way.

In a world featuring variety and creativity, the tendency will be to assume these as part of learning online.

תוויות: ילידים, סביבה לימודית, פלטפורמות

תוויות: ילידים, שימוש בבתי ספר

Finally, a kid, about nine or ten, reached up to that circle, grabbed the flag image, stopped its move up, and reversed the direction, dragging it down. His mother (I assume) gasped, grabbed her son by the shoulders and pulled him away from the display. It was such a perfect moment, one that probably repeats itself every day as our children seem so much more comfortable with an information environment that is central to how we do things today.

somewhat surprisingly, there has been very little research investigating the appropriate mouse control strategies for children

Because there is little empirical data available on how well young children are able to use a computer mouse, the present study examined their proficiency in clicking on small objects at various positions on the screen and their skill in moving objects over the screen, using drag-and-drop and click-move-click.

תוויות: רכישת מיומנויות

תוויות: דיווחים

a) it was conducted by a private consulting company, Cengage Learning so, as far as I know, there was no requirement for peer review;
b) only very limited methodological details have been publically released.

If we look at the data that this conclusion appears to be based on, it is pretty thin: "65 per cent of instructors think students are tech savvy when it comes to using digital tools in the classroom. Conversely, only 42 per cent of students believe there is enough support for educational technology, evidence of a perception gap in how adept students are versus how savvy they are presumed to be." Hardly myth-debunking evidence.

תוויות: ילידים

My typical day starts with a cup of coffee and a click on my browser icon. It's strange now that I think about it, but the first thing I do in the morning (no matter what I have to do during a particular day) is to start my browser - Safari. I don't stop to think - oh, I need my browser now! - I just do it.

… but it doesn't just stop at reading and clicking links. Fact is that whenever I find an interesting post or link I immediately feel the need to share it. A few years ago I'd perhaps email or IM the link to family or friends, but now it's just much more. I feel the need to share it with the world - I don't want just friends and colleagues to read this link, I want to give everyone in the world that might be interested in a certain topic a chance to read it!

Keeping a blog makes me an active seeker of content that will be interesting and relevant for you: the readers of my blog. I am now the editor of my personal channel and for this reason I feel a big responsibility for the "life" of my blog - it is up to me to keep it interesting, current and worth reading. And all this also makes my primary work as a researcher more engaging, and even more valuable and meaningful to me. I feel that I can do much more than just the task in front of me. I am constantly learning, collecting experiences and thinking about how they could be shared for others to read.

תוויות: בלוגים, כתיבה

Jukes is sharing some very interesting information about reading, that we (oldsters) typically read in a “Z” pattern. Our youngsters read in an “F” pattern.

The key question is, "How does this information affect how and what we teach?"

תוויות: אוריינויות

My work on blogs, articles, handbooks, and so on is an invitation to engage in conversation, not a proclamation of what I absolutely know.

When I write, and even when I speak, I am basically thinking aloud - and readers and listeners are able to follow along.

Watching others learn is an act of learning.

תוויות: בלוגים, כתיבה, למידה